Terminator 2:what if
by FreddysNightmare1984
Summary: What if,before John was born,Sarah had adopted a girl,Justine "Kylie" Connor?what if,after John was concieved,Sarah taught Kylie about the future,and Kylie helped teach John?what if,during T2,Kylie fell in love with...a Terminator? basically T2 with my OC
1. The beginning

**hey everyone, what's up?! i've _finally_ got a story in the Terminator ccatagory, YAY!!! i've never done a fic like this before, but hopefully it'll go well. i just recently became a fan of the Terminator movies, and have, so far, only seen the first three. the second one is _definatly_ the best!!!! it kicks the other movie's ass! anyway, i hope you enjoy this story, and i hope i write it well (i'm a little nervous about this one). be sure to review and let me know what you think. and to be perfectly clear, this is just T2 with my OC added into the story. i thought it'd be ineresting to have a character fall in love with a Terminator (highly unlikely, i know, but it think it's an interesting idea). now enough of my babbling, and ON WITH THE STORY!!!!!!!**

**DISCLAIMER: i _do not_ own anything related to the Terminator. nor do i own the movie Terminator 2: Judgment day. i only own Kylie Connor**

* * *

John Connor, at the moment was ten years old and busy reassembling the carburetor on his Honda 125 dirtbike. He had ripped Levi's and long stringy hair.

a sullen mouth.

eyes which revealed an intelligence as sharp as a scalpel. The Ramones' _"I Wanna Be Sedated"_ blasted from a boom box next to him. he'd been in the garage most of the afternoon, hanging out with his best friend, Tim Dooley. his foster mom, Janella Voight, suddenly walked in the doorway of the garage, yelling over the music.

"John?! John! Get in here right now and clean up that pigsty of yours!".

Tim, a thirteen-year-old delinquent, watched as John replied by turning up the volume on the boom box. Janelle gave up with a loud slam of the house's back door.

"Your foster parents are kinda dicks, right?" Tim said to John once Janelle was gone.

"Gimme that Phillips right there" John said, ignoring his friend's question.

_meanwhile, in the house..._

Janelle stormed into the living room. Todd Voight, her husband, was watching sports on the TV.

"i swear I've had it with that damn kid!" Janelle complained. "He won't even answer me".

Todd ignored her.

"Todd?!" Janelle snapped. "Are you gonna sit there or are you gonna do something?"

Todd sighed, throwing down the TV remote and going out to the garage, where John was just getting on his bike.

he Kick-started it.

Tim leaned down and picked up John's nylon bag while climbing on the back of the bike. Todd appeared just then, looking annoyed.

"John! Get your ass inside right now and do what your mother says!" Todd yelled, trying to be heard over the engine, which John reved louder and louder.

John looked at Todd, giving him a defiant glare. "She's not my mother, _Todd_!" He sneered, reving the engine and driving out of the garage, with Tim almost falling off the back. They took off down the street. John cut through a vacant lot to a trail running beside a fenced-in drainage canal. He gunned the bike through a hole in the retaining fence. Tim's eyes grew wide as they roared down the concrete embankment. once in the drainage canal, John zig-zagged along, throwing up a stream of muddy water. Tim shouted, trying to pretend he hadn't just seen his life flash before his eyes. when John stopped the bike, Tim smiled, slapping his friend on the back.

"Major moves, homes!" Tim said excitedly. "So... where is your real mom, anyway?"

John didn't answer

"She dead or something?" Tim pressed. he started hard at John, though It was hard for him to read John's expression.

"She might as well be" John mumbled, twisting the throttle angrily, causing the bike to lunge forward.

_meanwhile, at Pescadero state hospital- maximum security wing..._

the young woman grunted as she did her morning pull-ups, using the top leg of the bedframe for her exercises. her breathing grew heavier and heavier the more she pulled herself up and down. she concentrates on her pull-ups, her rythm never changing, her breathing growing ragged.

_in the hospital corridor..._

several young interns walked down the corridor of the hospital, led by Dr. Peter Silberman, who was a criminal psychologist. three attendants followed close behind the group.

"The next patient is a 29-year old female diagnosed as acute schizo-affective disorder" Silberman was saying."The usual indicators... depression, anxiety, violent acting-out, delusions of persecution".

the interns nodded judiciously.

"Here we are" Silberman said, stopping at one of the Soundproof steel doors of a cell. There was a two-way speaker beneath a tiny window on the front of the door. Silberman reached out, flipping the intercom switch.

in the cell, the inmate slowly turned to face the door. it was Sarah Conner, her eyes dark and wild through her mess of long, tangled hair.

"Morning, Sarah" Silberman said brightly, smiling nervously as he peered in the small window, looking at his paitent.

"Good morning, Dr. Silberman" Sarah sneered. "How's the knee?"

Silberman's smile faded for a moment, but he quickly smiled again.

"Fine, Sarah". he mumbled, swititching off the intercom and turning to the interns standing around him. "She, uh... stabbed me in the kneecap with my pen a few weeks ago" he said hesitantly. in the cell, Sarah watched as they talked about her through the glass, frustrated that she couldn't hear what they were saying. She felt like a caged animal.

a lab rat.

The interns looked in at her through the glass as Silberman continued talking. With her face drawn, eyes haggard and hair wild, they thought Sarah looked like she belonged where she was.

"The delusional architecture is interesting". Silberman was saying. "She believes a machine called a "terminator", which looks human of course, was sent back though time to kill her. And also that the father of her child was a soldier, sent to protect her... he was from the future too..." he paused, smiling as though the whole thing were a big joke. "he was from The year 2029, if I remember correctly" he continued. the interns laughed, shaking their heads. "Let's move on, shall we?" Silberman said. the interns nodded, turning and walking away. before following them, Silberman leaned toward Douglas, one of the attendants. "Douglas, I don't like seeing the patients disturbing their rooms like this" he said in a low voice. "See that she takes her thorazine, would you?" Douglas, a large, pudgy man, nodded, knowing what Silberman meant. he turned to Ralph, the other attendant, motioning for him to follow him into Sarah's cell as Silberman moves on in his rounds.

back in the cell, Sarah slowly looked up as the cell door opened. Douglas and Ralph walked in slowly, Douglas tapping his police baton against the door in a ominous rhythm. Ralph was carrying a stun baton, something like a sawed-off cattle prod. he was also holding a tray with cups of red liquid-thorazine.

"Time to take you meds, Connor" Douglas said, moving to stand in front of Sarah. Sarah turned to face him, weight centered. her wild eyes darted from Doug to Ralph.

"You take it" she snapped, tensing up.

Douglas grinned casually. "Now you know you got to be good 'cause you up for review this afternoon..." he started to say.

"I'm not taking it" Sarah said firmly. "Now I don't want any trouble..."

"Ain't no trouble at all" Douglas said, whipping the baton in a whistling backhand, which...

WHAP!

hits Sarah square in the stomach. She doubled over and dropped to her knees, unable to breathe. Douglas tipped the bed and it slammed down with a crash, right next to her. He nodded to Ralph, who slowly approached Sarah with the stun baton. Sarah laid on the floor helplessly, grimacing and struggling to breathe.

"You... son of a... AAARRGH!!" The stun baton suddenly hit her between the shoulder blades as she tried to rise. the pain drove her to the floor, pinning her like a bug. Little electric arcs crackled as the baton made her writhe in pain. Douglas then reached down and grabbed Sarah by the hair, jerking her up to her knees. he pressed the cup of thorazine in front of her lips.

"Last call, _sugar_!" he sneered, forcing the medication down Sarah's throat before leaving with Ralph. Sarah groaned, still laying on the floor. slowly growing drowsy...

_a little while later, in the parking lot of the local bank..._

John furtively hunched before a Ready-Teller machine at the rear of the local bank while Tim stood nearby, acting as a lookout. John then slipped a stolen ATM card into the machine slot. It was something he'd rigged up, because trailing from the card was a ribbon-wire which went to a black electronic box that he always carried in his knapsack. He held the pack between his knees and quickly pulled out a little lap-top keyboard, which was also connected to the black-box. John proceded to enter a few commands and the plasma-screen displayed the PIN number for a bank account.

He looked around to make sure no one was looking before he quickly entered the number on the Ready-Teller's keypad and asked it for $300. The machine whirred a few times, then began dispensing twenty-dollar bills. Tim looked back over his shoulder, amazed.

"Easy money!" John said, grabbing the bills and waving them triumphantly.

"Where'd you learn all this stuff?" Tim asked, awestruck.

"From my mom. My _real_ mom, I mean. and my sister" John answered, waiting for the machine to spit out a few more bills. "Come on baby..." he muttered under his breath, just as the rest of the money came out of the machine. "Let's go! he said, grabbing the last of the bills. the two then sprinted around the corner to an alley behind the bank, where John's bike was waiting for them. they huddled behind the building as John counted out Tim's share of the cash. He folded five twenties and handed them to his friend.

"hey, you!" a voice called. John and Tim jumped, whirling around at the sound of a loud voice.

"what do you want?!" John yelled angrily.

"i saw what you did you little pukes!" the voice snapped. "and don't think you can lie your way out of this, cause i'm calling the cops!"

John panicked for a second, finally seeling the person speaking. the person was a girl, standing near the other end of the alleyway. she was about half a foot taller then John, and was partcially hidden in the shadows.

"look lady, we don't want any trouble" John said.

"well you got trouble you little bastard!"

now John was mad. "hey bitch, don't...!"

the girl burst out laughing, coming out into the sunlight. John and Tim could clearly see her now, and John grinned when he saw her.

"Kylie!"

the girl laughed as she hurried over to John and hugged him.

"hey shrimp, how's it going?"

John laughed, while Tim looked stunned. "uh, can someone tell me what's going on?"

John turned to him. "oh yeah, right! Tim, this is my sister Kylie. Kyles, this is Tim".

Kylie smiled at the boy. "hey Tim, sup?" Tim's jaw dropped. Kylie was 18, and very pretty. she had long, dishwater blonde hair that went down to her waist, and bright blue eyes. she wore a black t-shirt and red pants that went a little past her knees. "so, that machine i gave you is coming in handy, huh?" Kylie siad.

John nodded. "yeah, Tim and i just got 300 bucks!"

Kylie forwned. "only 300? didn't i teach you better then that?" she smiled, lightly punching John on the arm. while they were having their brother/sister moment, Tim opened John's knapsack to put his money away, when he noticed a picture in a plastic sleeve.

"hey John, this your mom?"

John sighed, and nodded, reluctantly showing his friend the Polaroid. It was a shot of Sarah 11 years earlier, Pregnant with John, and in a jeep near the Mexican border. John didn't know it then, but he would carry that photo with him for over 30 years, and give it to a young man named Kyle Reese, who will travel back in time to become his father.

yes, it was _that_ photo.

"So she's pretty cool, huh?" Tim asked, nodding toward the picture.

"Actually, no, she's a complete psycho" John said bitterly. "that's why she's up at Pescedero. She tried to blow up a computer factory, but she got shot and arrested".

"No shit?!" Tim siad, his jaw droopping.

"Yeah, she's a total loser" John said.

"i always thought mom was cool" Kylie said. "even if she is crazy".

John sighed, stuffing the picture back in his sack. "C'mon, let's go spend some money, whatya say?"

Kylie frowned at her brother, sensing something was wrong. John had tried to sound casual, but she saw in his eyes that it really hurt.

she slapped John on the shoulder, smiling. "i'll catch you later, 'kay bro?" John nodded, smiling a little as he and Tim got on his Honda. then John fired it up, and they sped off down the alley.

John and Kylie didn't know it then, but those would be their last normal moments for a long time.

* * *

**well, how was it? i know Kylie came in kind of late, but she'll be in the majority of the story from now on. and i _really_ hope you like this so far, cause i'll delete it of no one likes it. so _please_ review, or i'll send the Terminator after you!!!**

_***Terminator kicks down the door and comes into the room***_

**Me:** "AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!! I _KNEW_ YOU'D COME!!!!!"

**Terminator:** "i said i'd be back. and now i am"

**Me:** _***giggles***_ "are you going to be here throughout this whole story?"

**Terminator:** "yes"

**Me:** "YYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!" _*looks at readers*_ "i mean _BOO_!!!!"

**Terminator:** "..."

**Me:** "wait, you're the _good_ Terminator, right? the one from the second movie?"

**Terminator:** "yes"

**Me:** _***smiling***_ "_cool_!! well, i guess i'll have the Terminator here with me for the rest of htis story. so, like i said, _REVIEW_ OR HE'LL GET YOU!!!!!!!"


	2. The chase

**hey guys, i'm back!! come on, i haven't gotten _one_ review!?!? is this story really that bad? if it is, i'll delete it ASAP. so at least let me know so i won't curse this website with my horrible writing. but anywho, on with the story!!**

**DISCLAIMER: i _do not_ own T2, or anything Terminator related. i only own Kylie Connor.**

* * *

In the galleria...  
Kylie made her way through the mall, bored as usual. her thoughts turned to John and his friend. _"i hope they're ok"_ she thought. she didn't like the idea of her kid brother being caught by the police, not again. she was so lost in thought, that she colided with someone. Kylie jumped, backing away from the person. "oh, i'm so sorry!" she said. she glanced at the person. he was a big man, that much was obvious. he was tall and very muscular, and he looked like he could easily kick anyone's ass at any time.

Kylie blushed. _"wow, he's hot!"_ was the first thing that passed through her head. "i... i'm really sorry" she stammered, quickly stepping past him and continuing on her way. she stopped for a second and glanced back at him. he was still standing there, staring at her. it was then that Kylie noticed that he was carrying a long box that had the name of an expensive florist on the side. _"he must've gotten flowers for his girlfriend"_ she thought, blushing again before she quickly turned and walked away. little did she know that that "man" was actually a Terminator, and he was moments away from changing her life forever.

meanwhile, at a nearby arcade...  
John worked his way through the crowded video arcade, Tim right behind him. "dude, would you stop asking me about Kylie already?!" John was saying. Tim had been asking questions about Kylie all afternoon, and it was really starting to annoy John.

"sorry dude, just one more question" Tim said. "how could someone like you have such a hot sister?"

John smirked. "she's actually not my sister, not biologically i mean".

"she's adopted?" Tim said.

John nodded. "yeah, mom adopted Kylie when she was seven, not long after mom met dad. Kylie's real name is Justine, but mom gave her Kylie as a middle name, after my dad apparently".

Tim laughed. "Kylie's real name is Justine?!" he snickered, trying not to burst out laughing.

John frowned. "yeah, but don't ever let her know i told you that. once i told someone, and they ended up in the hospital for two weeks".

Tim shuddered. "whoa, your sister sounds like a total badass!"

"she is, that's why we get along so well" John said. "she taught me everything i know".

"cool!"

elsewhere in the galleria...  
the "cop" was moving quickly through the flow of shoppers. The place was a zoo. He stopped some kids and showed them a picture of John he'd gotten earlier from Todd and Janelle. The kids shrugged. they'd never seen John before.

in the video arcade...  
John was lost in an intense battle, going for a new high score at _"Missile Command"_. He parried deftly as the enemy ICBMs deploy their MIRVs... the warheads streamed down... it was more than he can deal with.

BAM!

The world got nuked.

game over. John slouched away from the game, looking for another. bored.

the cop was passing the entrance of the store behind him. The "cop" moved on, down the concourse, out of sight.

John got in an _"Afterburner"_ simulator game. just then, someone tapped him on the shoulder, making him jump. "_shit_, don't do that Kylie!" he said, glaring at her. Kylie laughed, sitting on the edge of the seat John was in.

"lighten up John".

"what're you doing here anyway?" John asked, turning back to the Afterburner game.

"i was bored, so i thought i'd come here and waste some money. besides, i kind of figured i'd find you here" Kylie said, glancing over her shoulder. she wasn't sure why, but she'd been hoping to run into that hot guy again.

The Terminator walked through the crowded mall, scanning his surroundings. He moved with methodical purpose, knowing the target is close. he was, incredibly, carrying a box of long-stem roses, like some hopeful guy with a hot date. Meanwhile, The cop is pointed toward the arcade by some kids hanging out at the multi-cinema. He walked into the maze of kids engaged in synthesized combat. Cheap electronic effects blare above the crowd noise. John was shooting down MiGs at Mach 2, Kylie still sitting beside him. Just then, Tim slid up next to them and tapped John on the shoulder, trying to play it cool.

"Some cop is scoping for you, dude" Tim said. John looked around the corner of the _"Afterburner"_ ride and saw the cop showing a picture to some of the kids. The kids pointed his way at that moment. John ducked just as the cop glanced over toward him. He slunk out the other side of the ride and headed for the back of the store, instinctively retreating. Sarah had taught he and Kylie that cops are bad news.

"John, what are you doing?" Kylie said.

"come on Kyles, we have to get out of here" John said, grabbing his sister's hand and pulling her along with him. The cop scanned the crowded arcade and just managed to glimpse John looking back as he and Kylie moved around a row of machines. The cop started toward them. John saw the cop coming and started walking faster. Kylie looked back as the cop was shoving through clots of kids. One of them was actually slammed to the floor. the cop was gaining speed.

"run!" Kylie hissed as the cop broke into a run. kids scattered like ten-pins as the cop charged after John and Kylie. The siblings sprinted through a door at the back of the building that led to the arcade's back office and store-rooms. They were desperate to get away.

in the service corridor...  
John emerged through a firedoor into a long corridor with connects to the parking garage, Kylie close behind him. They were running full out, when around the corner ahead of them came...

the terminator.

Time seemed to stretch into a nightmarish crawl as John and Kylie tried to brake to a stop. The Terminator reached into the box of roses he was carrying, quickly pulling out a shotgun, roses spilling to the floor. The Terminator's boot crushed a few of the flowers as he moved forward. John, transfixed by terror, was trapped in the narrow featureless shooting gallery of the corridor. The shotgun came up. The Terminator expressionlessly strode forward. jacked a round into the chamber, slow and fluid. Kylie looked behind her for a place to run. Her eyes widened when she saw the cop coming toward them, pulling out his Beretta pistol. That's when Kylie realized that the cop was aiming his gun at John! She turned and looked back at Terminator. She and John were then starting into the black muzzle of the 10-gauge now. aimed right at their heads.

_"we are so screwed!"_ Kylie thought.

Then something crazy happened...

"Get down" the Terminator said. John and Kylie instinctively ducked. The Terminator pulled the trigger.

KABOOM!

The cop caught the shotgun's blast square in the chest just as he fired the pistol. The pistol's shot went wild. The Terminator quickly pumped another round into him. Then another. And another. Advancing a step each time he fired, he emptied the shotgun into the cop, blowing him backward down the corridor. Kylie winced. The sound was deafening. Then silence. The cop laid still on his back.

"John" Kylie whispered, her voice quivering. "get out of here _now_. run outside and keep running, don't look back. no matter what happens!"

John stared at his sister, wide eyed. "_what_?! No way, I'm not leaving you…!"

"John, I'm not going to argue. Go, _now_!"

John didn't move.

Kylie sighed. "don't worry about me, I'll be fine! Now _go_!" John took a step back, hesitant.

"I love you Kyles" he said softly. Kylie smiled, kissing John on the forehead.

"I love you too John. Now go on, get!" John nodded and quickly turned, heading for the car garage where he'd parked his bike earlier. Once John was out of sight, Kylie looked back at the Terminator. He was standing in front of her. They both watched as the cop, incredibly, sat up, unharmed, and got to his feet. the Terminator suddenly turned and grabbed Kylie roughly by her jacket, spinning around just as the cop opens fire with the Beretta. Kylie's heart beat fast as the Terminator clutched her against his chest. _"what the hell is going on?!"_ Kylie thought, struggling in the machine's iron grip. The "cop", who not only wasn't a cop, he clearly wasn't even human, kept firing shots as the 9mm slugs slammed into the Terminator, punching bloody holes in the machine's motorcycle jacket. Kylie was bug-eyed with fear, but completely unscratched. the Terminator's body had blocked the bullets. The Beretta clacked, empty.

the Terminator turned at the sound, Shoving Kylie through the open door of a broom closet next to him. Then he dropped the empty shotgun, walking toward the "cop". The cop quickly inserted another round of bullets into his gun. the Terminator still had twenty feet to go. He never broke his purposeful stride. The cop then opened fire, Bullets raking the Terminator's chest. He didn't even flinch. only Ten feet to go.

BLAM!

BLAM!

BLAM!

BLAM!

Neither the cop nor the Terminator showed the slightest change in expression as the pistol ripped the Terminator's wardrobe to shreds.

CLACK!

The pistol emptied again. the Terminator stopped two feet in front of the cop. They appraised each other for a second. Kylie realized then that Sarah had been right all along. Terminator's did exist! _"just, not yet"_ she thought. She realized that the cop must've been a terminator too. As a matter of fact, he _was_ a terminator, a T-1000 to be exact. A newer model than the one Sarah had described to her. This guy was a prototype... and little did Kylie know, he had quite a few surprises. as she was taking all this in, The T-1000 and the Terminator were sizing each other up. the Terminator moved first. He grabbed T-1000 in his massive hands, but the T-1000 snapped back with a counter-grip. After about two seconds of intense slamming, the walls on both sides of the corridor had all the plaster smashed in, and the two battling machines had blasted through the wall and disappeared. Kylie, totally stunned by all this, suddenly remembered to move. She staggered to her feet, Stumble-running toward the parking garage.

in the third level concourse...  
A plate glass window exploded without warning, and the Terminator crashed through to the tile floor like a sack of cement amid the screaming crowd. The T-1000 turned without a word and headed back through the store after Kylie and John, accelerating slowly into a loping, predatory run. the Terminator didn't move, laying totally still. A nearby tourist cautiously stepped forward and took a picture of the body. Suddenly, the Terminator's eyes snapped open. The stunned tourist backed away. the Terminator sat up and looked around, getting his bearings. then he rose smoothly to his feet. All servos seemed to be working fine. The tourist's camera whirred as the motor-drive ran on by itself, taking shot after shot. The owner wasn't even looking through the eyepiece, he was so shocked.

in the parking garage...  
John was frantically pumping the kick-start of his bike, scared shitless. _"damn thing, why won't you start!"_ he thought. He'd been pacing back and forth in front of his bike for the past few minutes, debating weather or not to go back for Kylie. He'd finally decided to do as she said, and get the hell away form the mall. And now His hands were shaking so badly he couldn't find the choke. He looked up just then and saw -- The T-1000 running down the corridor toward him. John fumbled with the choke. The bike caught. He slammed it in gear and spun the bike out into the main aisle of the garage. John took a chance and looked back… the T-1000 was behind him, running. John twisted the throttle and gunned the little bike forward. Incredibly, the T-1000 was gaining. _"This nightmare isn't happening!"_ he thought. John raced out the exit ramp, and charged right into the street.

Meanwhile, back in the mall…  
Kylie turned the corner, heading toward the parking garage where she knew John had gone to get his bike. _"John better have listened to me!"_ she thought as she turned another corner and slammed into something, causing her to fall on her back on the hard floor. "ow!" Kylie groaned as she sat up, looking at who she'd run into. "_you_!" she cried, her eyes widening at the sight of the Terminator standing over her.

"Kylie Connor?" he said in a thick Austrian accent, his face an expressionless mask. Kylie's heart pounded in her chest as she nodded slowly.

"y-yes, I'm Kylie. And are you going to tell me what the hell is going on?! Why are you after me and my brother?!"

"I am not the one after you. The T-1000 is" the Terminator said. "you and John are in great danger". He leaned his hand down toward her.

"now come with me if you want to live. We must get to John before the T-1000 does". Kylie stared at him for a minute.

"I'm going to regret this" she mumbled, hesitantly taking the Terminator's hand.

meanwhile...  
John shot into the busy traffic, cutting off a big-rig tow truck. The driver swore, hitting his air horn. What the driver didn't see was the "cop", who emerged onto the street and ran back at the truck.

in the truck...  
The driver heard a thump as something slammed against his door, then he suddenly felt himself pulled right out. the T-1000 slid in and took his place. The truck was still rolling along about 25 mph, and the T-1000 accelerated after John without missing a beat. It can see him up ahead, weaving through traffic. out of the garage entrance, the Terminator roared onto the street on his Harley, Kylie sitting behind him on the back of the bike. He accelerated after the others.

in the flod control channel...  
John slid his bike down the service ramp faster than he'd ever done it before. He raced along the bottom of the canal, turning into a narrower tributary which had vertical sides. He took a chance and looked back. No sign of the pursuing T-1000. Suddenly he sa the sun blocked out by a great shadow. The Kenworth tow-truck... big as a house, all chrome and roaring diesel engine... crashed through the fence and launched itself right into the center of the canal. It crashed down, 15 feet to the ground, going about 60, hit at an angle and tore into the concrete wall with a hideous grinding of metal. It then ricocheted back and forth between the walls.

Then, bellowing like a gunshot stegosaurus, it just kept on plowing forward, gathering speed. John looked back again and saw the wall of metal almost filling the narrow concrete canal and he milked every last bit of throttle that his little bike had. The Kenworth was all muscle, tearing along the canal like a train in a tunnel. Its big tires sent up huge sheets of muddy spray, backlit in the setting sun. It looked like some kind of demon.

And... it was gaining.

above them, on the service road running parallel, the Terminator was fighting to overtake them. He looked down and saw John with the tow truck from Hell catching up to him. It is only about twenty feet behind him and still gaining. in the canal, a desperate John looked back at the wall of metal filling frame behind him, more scared then he'd ever been in his life. above, the Terminator cut the bike suddenly hard to the left, leaving the road, and nearly knocking Kylie off the bike. Hitting an earth embankment just right, he jumped the bike into the air like Steve McQueen in "The Great Escape" and vaulted the fence bordering the canal. The bike slammed down at the edge of the canal and tore along, inches from the drop-off on a dirt path, accelerating past the truck in the canal below. John hit some water and slew, momentarily loosing speed. The massive push-plate on the front of the truck slammed into his back fender. panicked, John pulled a little ahead.

All this was happening at about sixty miles and hour, top speed for the little dirt bike. everything seemed to suddenly happen in slow motion for Kylie as the Terminator jumped the bike again. this time the 700- pound Harley sailed out into space and dropped into the canal. It arced down between the truck and John, hitting on its wheels. It bottomed out, an explosion of sparks shooting out from under the frame. only the ultra-fast reflexes of a machine could keep the bike upright. The Terminator fought for control. He gunned the throttle and the powerful bike roared up beside John's tiny Honda. The Terminator swept the kid off his machine with one arm and swung him onto the Harley, in front of him. John's Honda weaved and fell, smashing instantly under thundering tires of the Kenworth.

The Harley roared ahead, hitting eighty mph. Ahead was an overpass, and supporting it was an abutment which bisected the canal into two channels. The Harley thundered into one channel, which was essentially a short tunnel. Kylie glanced behind her. "That truck can't fit on either side!" she thought. Neither could it stop, at that speed. Tires locked as it slid on the muddy concrete and piled into the concrete abutment at seventy mph. the Terminator, John, and Kylie emerged from the tunnel, looking back to see a fireball blast through behind them as the truck's side-tanks exploded. The Terminator stopped the Harley. John peered around the machine's massive body to see the destruction. A burning wheel wobbled out of the tunnel and flopped in the mud. the Terminator then reved the bike and drove away, down the canal, disappearing around a bend.

Back at the wreckage, a column of black smoke rose from the overpass. Smoke boiled from the tunnel as well, and inside it was a solid wall of flame. A figure suddenly appeared in the fire. just an outline. walking slowly... calmly. The figure emerged from the flames. It was human-shaped, but far from being human. a smooth chrome man. not a servo-mechanism like the Terminator is underneath, with its complex hydraulics and cables... this thing was a featureless, liquid chrome surface, bending seamlessly at knees and elbows as it walked. It was similar to mercury. a mercury man. Its face was simple, unformed. Unruffled by thousand-degree heat, it walked forward. with each step, detail returns.

First, the shape and lines of its clothing emerged from the liquid chrome surface, then finer details...

buttons,

facial features,

ears...

But it was still all chrome. with its last step, the color returned to everything. It was the cop again...

handsome

young face,

blond hair,

icy eyes.

It stopped and looked around. It was a perfect chameleon. a liquid metal robot. a killing machine with the ultimate skills of mimicry for infiltration of human society. nearby, several police cruisers and a fire truck pulled up. the T-1000 climbed out of the canal behind them. More cops arrived. the T-1000 blended in perfectly. There are always cops at disasters and scenes of violence. its choice of protective mimicry is perfect. It walked among the other cops, unnoticed. It then got into one of the squad cars, Started it and drove away.

meanwhile...  
the Terminator, with John in front of him, and Kylie behind him on the Harley, roared down an empty street. John craned his neck around to get a look at the person/thing he and his sister were riding with. John was still in shock from the experience of what had just happened. "Whoa... time out. Stop the bike!"John cried, making a time out signal with his hands. the Terminator immediately complied, leaning the bike into a turn. they headed into a nearby alley.

in the alley  
the Terminator's bike rolled into the alley and came to a stop. John and Kylie slide off the bike. Kylie nearly fell to her knees, her legs shaking.

the Terminator sat on the bike, impassively staring at her. John checks out the machine.

"Now don't take this the wrong way, but you're a terminator, right?" John said tentatively.

"Yes. Cyberdyne Systems, Model 101" the Terminator replied.

"no way!" Kylie gasped. She slowly reached out and touched the Terminator's face, feeling his soft, human-like skin. John walked behind him and touched the blood on his jacket. The ten year olds' mind overloaded as the reality of it hit him.

"holy shit... you're really _real_! I mean... _whoa_!" he said, stepping back.

"You're, uh... like a machine underneath, right... but sort of alive outside?" Kylie questioned.

"I'm a cybernetic organism. living tissue over a metal endoskeleton" the Terminator said.

"This is intense" John mumbled. "Get a grip, John. okay, uh... you're not here to kill us..."

Kylie rolled her eyes. "no shit, Sherlock" she said sarcastically.

"So what's the deal?" John asked.

"My mission is to protect you. both of you" the Terminator said.

"Yeah? Who sent you?" Kylie asked.

the Terminator turned to her. "You did. Thirty years from now you reprogrammed me to be your and John's protector here, in this time".

John gave him an amazed look. "This is deep".

a little while later...  
John, Kylie, and the Terminator were on the bike again, weaving through the side streets.

They blended into the evening traffic. In the darkness, the Terminator's wounds were not readily visible.

John craned his head up and back. "So this other guy? He's a terminator too, right, like you?"

"Not like me" the Terminator said. "a T-1000. advanced prototype. a mimetic polyalloy".

"What the hell does that mean?" Kylie asked.

"Liquid metal" the Terminator answered.

"Radical" John murmured.

"You are both targeted for termination. the T-1000 will not stop until it complete its mission. _ever_". John and Kylie mulled that over.

"Where we going?" John asked.

"We have to leave the city, immediately. And avoid the authorities". the Terminator said.

"Can I stop by my house? I want to get some stuff" John said.

"Negative. The T-1000 will definitely try to reacquire you there" the Terminator said.

"you sure?" Kylie said worriedly.

The Terminator turned to look at her. "I would".

a few minutes later, the Terminator dorve in a parking lot near a payphone.

John quickly went through his pockets for change. He had plenty of bills but no quarters. "Look, Todd and Janelle are dicks, but I gotta warn them" he said as he finished fumbling through his pockets. "_Shit_! You got a quarter sis?" John asked when he found he didn't have any change.

Kylie shook her head. "sorry John, I don't have anything".

John turned to the Terminator. "how about you? You got a quarter?"

the Terminator didn't answer, but he reached past John and smashed the cover plate off the phone's cash box with the heel of his hand. A shower of change tumbled out. the Terminator then handed one to John. "thanks" John mumbled as he dialed. "Janelle? It's me" he said a few seconds later when the phone was answered. In the backyard, John could hear his German Shepherd going bonkers, barking at something.

"John? Where are you, honey? It's late. You should come home, dear. I'm making a casserole" Janelle said worriedly.

John listened, an odd look on his face. He covered the phone's mouthpiece and turned to Kylie and the Terminator.

"Something's wrong. She's never this nice" he whispered.

Kylie frowned. "your foster parents treat you like crap?"

John nodded. "The dog's really barking" he said worriedly. "maybe the other Terminator's already there. what should I do?" the Terminator suddenly reached over and took the phone from John's hand.

Janelle's voice was floating through the receiver.

"John? John, are you okay?"

the Terminator spoke into the phone in a perfect imitation of John's voice...

"I'm right here. I'm fine". he frowned suddenly, covering the mouthpiece with his hand. "What's the dog's name?" he asked John(in his regular voice).

"Max" John whispered.

The Terminator nodded, speaking into the phone again(in John's voice). "Hey, Janelle, what's wrong with Wolfy? I can hear him barking. Is he okay?"

"Wolfy's fine, honey, Wolfy's just fine. Where are you?" Janelle asked. the Terminator unceremoniously hung up the phone, turning to John and Kylie.

"Your foster parents are dead. Let's go". He said, heading for the bike.

Kylie, shocked, followed after him.

in the voight house/kitchen...  
Janelle hung up the phone, Her expression neutral.

calm.

her arm was stretched out straight from the shoulder.

Partway along its length, her arm had turned smoothly into something else…

a metal cylinder which tapered into a sword-like spike. Todd Voight was pinned to a kitchen cabinet by the spike, which had punched through his milk carton, through his mouth and exited the back of his head into the cabinet door. His eyes were glassy and lifeless. The spike was suddenly withdrawn

SWIISHHTT!

so rapidly, Todd actually stood there a second before he slumped out of sight. thump! Janelle didn't bat an eye as the spike smoothly changed shape and color, transforming back into a hand, and then...

Janelle changed rapidly into the "cop", the T-1000. The change had liquid quality. the T-1000 opened the back door, approaching the big German Shepherd, which slinked away from the machine, barking in fear. the T-1000 walked right into pen, Reaching down toward the animal. There was a sickening thunk followed by a shrill yelp. Then the T-1000's hand snapped up, holding a bloody dog collar. The tag read Max. the T-1000 nodded thoughtfully, heading back to the house.

back in the parking lot...  
it was dark in the quiet street.

the Terminator stood near the Harley, watching John pace before him. Kylie stood beside the Terminator, glancing at him every few seconds. her brain was calling time-out. this was all too weird.

"I need a minute here, okay?" John said. he looked at the Terminator. "you're telling me that the T-1000 can imitate anything it touches?"

"Anything it samples by physical contact" the Terminator replied. John thought about that, trying to grasp their opponent's parameters.

"Like it could disguise itself as anything...

"a pack of cigarettes?" Kylie guessed.

the Terminator looked at her. "No, only an object of equal size". John and Kylie were both still reeling from meeting one terminator, who now seemed downright conventional next to the exotic new model.

"Well, why doesn't become a bomb or something to get us?" John asked.

"It can't form complex machines. guns and explosives have chemicals, moving parts. It doesn't work that way. but it can form solid metal shapes" the Terminator answered. John sat on the curb, lost in stunned thought. Kylie stood leaning against the bike, the Terminator next to her, watching the street like a Doberman. He glanced at Kylie.

"We spent a lot of time in Nicaragua... places like that" Kylie was saying, telling the machine about how Sarah had raised her and her brother. "For a while mom was with this crazy ex-Green Beret guy, running guns. Then there were some other guys. She'd shack up with anybody she could learn from. So then she could teach John and me how to be these great military leaders. Then she gets busted and it's like... sorry kids, your mom's a psycho. Didn't you know? It's like..."

"everything we'd been brought up to believe was just made-up of bullshit, right?" John finished, walking toward them and hearing the end of the conversation. "I hated her for that" he continued, looking at the Terminator. "But everything she said was true. We gotta get her out of there".

"Negative. The T-1000's highest probability for success now would be to copy Sarah Connor and wait for you two to make contact with her" the machine said.

"Oh, great. And what happens to her?" Kylie asked.

"Typically, the subject being copied is Terminated" the Terminator replied matter-of-factly.

"_terminated_!? _Shit_! Why didn't you tell us? We gotta right now!" John cried.

"Negative. She is not a mission priority" the Terminator said.

"Yeah, well fuck you, she's a priority to me!" John yelled, striding away. the Terminator went after him and grabbed his arm. John struggled against the grip, which didn't do him much good. "Hey, dammit! What's your problem?" he yelled as the Terminator started dragging him back to the bike. John spotted a couple of collage-age, slab-o-meat jock-types across the street and started yelling to them. "Help! HELP!! I'm being kidnapped! Get this psycho off of me!" The two jocks started toward them. John yelled in outrage to the Terminator.

"please, let go of him!!" Kylie cried. To her surprise, the Terminator's hand opened so fast, John fell right on his butt. He looked up at the open hand.

"Oww! Why'd you do that?" John cried.

"she told me to". The Terminator said, looking at Kylie. John stared at the machine in amazement as he realized...

"You have to do what we say?!"

"That is one of my mission parameters".

"Prove it" John said, getting to his feet. "stand on one foot".

the Terminator expressionlessly lifted one leg.

John grinned. "Cool! my own terminator. This is great!"

Kylie sighed, rolling her eyes. "he's not your personal performing monkey John, he's a futuristic killing machine! And besides, he has to listen to _me_ too". Just then, The two jocks got there and looked at the Terminator standing there calmly with one leg up in the air. this big guy in black leather and dark glasses, standing like a statue.

"Hey, kid. You okay?" one of them asked. John turned to him, no longer needing to be rescued.

"Take a hike, bozo" John said.

"Yeah? Fuck you, you little dipshit!" the other jock said.

"Dipshit? Did you say dipshit?!" John asked, turning o the Terminator. "Grab this guy" he commanded. the Terminator complied instantly, hoisting the guy up, one-handed, by the collar. the guy's legs were pinwheeling. "Now who's the dipshit, you jock douchebag?" John said, smirking. Immediately, things got out of hand. The guy's friend jumped behind the Terminator and tried to grab him in a full nelson, but the Terminator threw the first guy across the hood of a car, grabbed the second by the hair, whipped out his .45 in a quick blur, and aimed the muzzle at the guy's forehead. Kylie grabbed the Terminator's arm with a yell as he pulled the trigger… Kylie's weight was just enough to deflect the gun a few inches. The guy flinched, stunned by the K-BOOM next to his ear. He stared, shocked. practically pissing himself. John and Kylie are freaking out, too.

"Put the gun down! NOW!!" Kylie screamed at the Terminator. The Terminator obediently set the .45 on the sidewalk. John scooped it up fast, then turned to the shocked civilians, who couldn't believe what just happened.

"go on, get out of here" John said. they did.

Fast.

John grabbed the Terminator by the arm and tugged him toward the bike, still holding the gun, and feeling reluctant to give it back. "geeze... you were gonna kill that guy!" John gasped.

"of course. I'm a terminator" the machine said simply. John stared at him. having his own terminator just became a little bit less fun to him.

"Listen to me, _very_ carefully, okay? You're not a terminator any more. alright? You got that? You can't just go around killing people!"

"Why?" the Terminator asked.

"Whattaya mean, why? 'Cause you can't!" Kylie said.

"Why?" the Terminator asked again.

"You just can't, okay? trust us on this" John said. the Terminator just didn't get it. John and Kylie stared at him, Frightened at what just almost happened. John had just gotten a glimpse of the responsibility that comes with power. finally he handed the .45 back to the Terminator, who put it away. "Look, we're gonna go get our mom. And I _order_ you to come with us".

* * *

**well, how was that one? any better, worse? _please_ let me know, i need to know if you guys like this or not.**

**Terminator: i did not like it**

**me: you're a Terminator, you don't like anything**

**Terminator: true**

**me_:*rolls eyes*_ anyway, please review guys!! until next time, peace!!!**


	3. Saving Sarah

**hey guys, i'm back!!!! whew, this chapter is _LONG_, and it took me a while to get it finished. but it _is_ finished, so i hope you enjoy chapter 3:)**

**DISCLAIMER: i _do not_ own T2. i only own Kylie Connor**

* * *

Detective Weathersby slapped a black and white photograph on the table in front of him. The image was a nightmare from the past. It was a surveillance camera still-frame from the L.A. police station where the first terminator made such an impression in 1984. The picture showed the blurry form of a cop frozen in the emergency lights of a burning corridor. A black-clad figure stood at the end of the corridor. The guy had short-cropped hair and dark glasses, an AR-80 assault rifle in one hand, and a 12-gauge in the other -- holding them both like toy pistols. Weathersby slapped another photo on top of the first.

It showed the Terminator as he loomed in close up. "These were taken at the West Highland police station in 1984. You were there" Weathersby was saying to Sarah. Weatherby's partner, detective Mossberg, and Dr. Silberman, sat at the table as well. Two uniformed cops, plus Douglas, stood by the door. Sarah stared listlessly at the top photo. She was withdrawn, haggard... drugged-looking.

"He killed seventeen police officers that night. Recognize him?" Mossberg asked. Weathersby sighed and slapped another black-and-white eight-by-ten on the table. This one was a closeup of the Terminator taken by the tourist at the mall. It's the same face. "This one was taken by a tourist today" Mossberg continued. Sarah didn't react. It was hard for the men to tell what she was thinking, or Whether she was up hope or just in a drugged stupor.

"Ms. Connor, you've been told that your son's missing. That his foster parents have been murdered, and we know this guy's involved. talk to us. Don't you care?" Weathersby said, desperate to get Sarah talking. Sarah stared up at him. a cold and empty stare. He glances at Silberman. then at his partner.

"We're wasting out time" Mossberg mumbled. One of the uniformed cops opened the door and Mossberg strode into the hall. Weathersby and the two uniforms followed him out, with Silberman right behind.

"Sorry, gentleman..." Silberman told them. Sarah stayed seated in the chair, slumped under the bright lights. Totally out of it. Then she slowly lifted her hand, creeping along the edge of the table toward the stack of photos. She slipped off the paper clip binding the stills together, and hid it between her fingers. Douglas then jerked her up by the arms and lead her out of the room.

in Sarah's cell...  
Douglas inched up the last of Sarah's restraints. then he leaned over her, looking down. Even wrecked as she is, it was easy to see the beauty in her face. Douglas slowly bent down, almost as if he was going to kiss her. Instead he ran his tongue across her face like a dog would. Sarah seemed not to even see him, her dull eyes looking past him. He couldn't provoke a reaction. Even here, strapped down, the two of them alone, she gave him no superiority. He smirked and left, the sound of his night-stick tapping its way down the corridor ringing loudly, growing fainter. suddenly Sarah's eyes snapped open, alert. There was intensity and resolve in them. She slipped the paper clip out from between her fingers and awkwardly spread it open into a straight piece of wire. With slow, painful concentration she moved it toward the lock of the restraints that bind her wrists to the bed at her sides.

the Terminator, John, and Kylie charged through the night on the Harley, Streetlights flaring past them like comets. two serious guys and a hot chick with a mission. one a ten-year old kid, the girl being his older sister, and the other a half-man/half-machine cyborg from the post-Apocalyptic future.

back in Sarah's cell...  
Sarah finally unlatched the restraint, successfully picked by her paper clip. That was not an easy thing to do, but she had taught herself a lot of things in her years of hiding. Sarah, her hands free, sat up and released the Velcro straps on her feet. Then she rolled off the bed, totally alert, and almost feral in her movements.

In the hospital's guard shack, a bored security guard glanced up as an LAPD black-and- white car pulled up. He raised the barricade and nodded to the T-1000/cop as it passed. The cruiser pulled in next to the other police vehicles. The T-1000 then walked toward the main entrance.

meanwhile, Sarah was using the paper clip on the door lock. She could hear an echoing tapping sound. It was getting louder, coming her way. She quickly went back to work on the lock.

in the corridor...  
Douglas the attendant was tapping his stick along the wall like he did every night on his rounds. He shined a little mag-light in the windows of the cells as he passed, barely slowing. He rounded the corner, his footsteps echoing in the dark hallway. The tip of the stick hit the wall; Tap, tap, tap... getting closer to Sarah's cell. He stopped at the door, about to shine his light in, when he noticed that a utility closet across the hall was open. He went to shut it, absently flicking his light into the dark closet.

He noticed something strange among the buckets and cleaning supplies. A mop lie on the floor, with its handle snapped off about halfway up. The other half was missing. Douglas pondered this for half a second, then heard a sound behind him, making him spin around. The sound he heard was Sarah's cell door. The missing two feet of mop handle filled his vision as it cracked viciously across the bridge of his nose. 250 pounds of doughy attendant hit the floor like a sack of cement.

Sarah then slammed the makeshift baton down expertly across the back of his head, bouncing him off the linoleum. lights out, Douglas. She dragged him into her cell and locked him in with his own keys, then swapped her mop-handle for his nice, heavy night-stick. She then continued to move down the dark corridor, cat-stepping in her bare feet. She held the baton like a pro, laid back along the forearm, police- style. She looked dangerous...

A long corridor ended at a reception area, which was closed, and a night receiving desk, which was a glass window where they could buzz you in through a heavy door. A night nurse typed at a desk nearby. She looked up at the sound of footsteps and saw a young cop (the T-1000) walking toward her. "You have a Sarah Connor here?" the T-1000 asked. The nurse assumed he was with the other cops, and smiled.

"Running late, aren't you?" she asked, turning to the inner door to buzz him in, just in time to see Silberman and the cops coming toward the door from the other side. "Your friends are on their way out now..." the nurse said as she turned back to the window, surprised to see that the "cop" was no longer there. She went to the counter and leaned out to see if he was at the drinking fountain or someplace. no, Reception was empty. And so was the long corridor beyond.

She frowned. too weird. Silberman then came through the solenoid door with Mossberg and Weathersby, the two uniformed cops, and the hospital security guard. The guard retrieved his 9mm pistol from a lock-out box behind the night desk, Silberman facing him. "Lewis, see these gentleman out and them lock up for the night" Silberman said. The security guard nodded, and Silberman went back into the secure area of the hospital as the cops walked down the long corridor to the main doors. no sign of the T-1000. Mossberg and the other cops exited, and Lewis locked the door behind them.

he walked slowly back along the long corridor. The hall was dark, with the light at the night desk far ahead like a sanctuary. His footsteps rang hollowly on the tile floor, His keys jingling loudly. Suddenly, the floor started to move. It shivered and bulged upward like a liquid mass, still retaining the two-tone checkerboard of the tile. It hunched up silently into a quivering shadow in the darkness past the guard. Up ahead, the night nurse was busy typing. she had her back turned, working. Lewis stopped at the drinking fountain, bending to take a sip. Behind him, the fluid mass reached six feet of height and began to resolve rapidly into a human figure. It lost the color and texture of the tile and became... Lewis.

The T-1000's mass had been spread out a quarter of an inch thick over several square yards of floor. When Lewis had walked over the T-1000, his structure had been sampled that instant. now the T-1000 drew in and pulled up to form the figure of the guard. The T-1000/Guard's feet are the last to form, the last of the "liquid floor" pulling in to form shiny black guard shoes. The shoes detached with a faint sucking sound from the real floor as the T-1000/Guard took its first step. Lewis spun at the sound of footsteps to see... himself. He had one deeply disturbing moment to consider the ramifications of that, Then his double calmly raised its hand and, inexplicably, pointed his right index finger directly at the real Lewis's face, about a foot away. In a split second, the finger speared out, elongating into a thin steel rod which snapped out like a stiletto, slamming into the guard's eye. It punched into the corner of the eye, past the eyeball like a trans- orbital lobotomy tool, and emerged from the back of the guard's skull. Life quietly emptied from the guard's face. He was dead weight, hanging from the rod/finger, which suddenly reacted --

SSSNICK.

As the guard slumped, the T-1000 took his weight easily with one hand and walked him, like it was carrying a suit on a hanger, back toward the night desk. The wounds were so tiny, no blood dripped onto the floor. The night nurse glanced up as the T-1000/Lewis walked past, dragging something casually which she couldn't see because it was below the countertop. "Whatcha got, Lewis?" she asked.

"Just some trash" the T-1000 said casually. She nodded, uninterested. The T-1000 moved past, dragging the unseen guard toward a closet down the hall from the night receiving station. The T-1000/Lewis removed the Browning High-Power pistol and the keys from the real Lewis's belt, then stuffed the body into the utility closet.

at the night recieving desk...  
T-1000/Lewis went back out and glanced at the nurse. "All set" the T-1000 said. the nurse glanced toward him, seeing the Beretta in his holster.

"Gotta check the gun first, Lewis" she said. the T-1000/Lewis nodded slowly.

"yeah, sorry". It opened Lewis' locker and blocked it from the nurse's view with its body as it mimed putting the gun in. but instead of setting the gun in the locker, it inserted the pistol into its own chest, where is disappeared inside like it was dropped into a pot of hot fudge. It withdrew its hand, The chest once again a surface that looked like cloth, buttons, name-tag etc. You'd ever guess it was really an intelligent liquid metal being. The T-1000 slammed the locker door and waited as the nurse hit a button, unlocking the door with a

BUZZ-CLACK.

then the T-1000/Lewis went through.

There was a small room before a short sally-port corridor designed to prevent violent inmates from making a run for it. There were doors at each end. The first one was barred like a jail-cell door, and the second was a steel fire door. The attendants had a video monitor with which they could see the corridor on the other side of the doors. The two bored attendants barely noticed the T-1000/Lewis as it approached. It looked briefly at a chart next to the door, seeing Sarah Connor was in #19. In the isolation ward, the T-1000 passed a nurses' station which looked like a cage, walled in by heavy metal mesh.

Silberman, leaning in the open doorway, was talking to an attendant in the cage. He didn't glance twice as the T-1000/Lewis passed by. Sarah, moving like a ghost in the darkened corridor, heard footsteps coming and quietly but quickly unlocked a cell next to her with Douglas' master key. She slipped into the cell and waited as the footsteps passed. the T-1000/Lewis passed the window. Sarah waited as the footsteps fade away. She looked over. a female inmate, strapped to a bed, watched her with bird-like eyes. Sarah put a finger to her lips – "SSHHH". The inmate nodded as Sarah left.

Meanwhile, Silberman, yawning, looked at his watch. He turned to go... but Sarah was there. She slammed into him, hurling him through the door into the cage and followed him in. The orderly jumped up, going for his stunner, but Sarah nailed him with Douglas' baton.

WHAP!

WHAP!

WHAP!

the thing was barely visible, Sarah was swinging it so fast. The guys went down. Silberman lunged for the alarm button and she cracked down hard on his arm. He cried out and grabbed his wrist. She grabbed him by the hair and slammed him face down on the desk, smacking him behind the knees expertly with the baton. His legs buckled and he dropped to his knees with his chin on the desk. She pinned him with one hand. His face was full of outraged disbelief.

"You broke my arm!" Silberman yelled.

"There's 215 bones in the human body, mother_fucker_. That's _one_. Now don't move!" Sarah sneered. Moving rapidly, she whipped open a medication drawer and grabbed a syringe. They kept a few of these handy for tranking unruly patients. Sarah jammed it into the orderly's butt and fired the whole shot. Still holding the empty syringe, she saw what she needed next. They also kept the toxic cleaning supplies in there to keep the inmates from drinking Drano. She grabbed a plastic jug of liquid plum'r and slammed it down on the desk inches from Silberman's eyes. She jammed the empty syringe into the plastic jug and drew back the plunger.

The syringe filled with blue liquid. She whipped it out of the jug and jammed the needle into Silberman's neck. His horrified eyes racked toward it. 10 cc's of blue death fill the cylinder. Her thumb hovered over the plunger. She jerked Silberman to his feet by the collar and got a tight grip on him, then hauled him through the door. In the corridor outside cell #19, the T-1000 stopped and looked in the window. Douglas, his face a bloody mess, yelled to be heard. "Open the door! The damn bitch is loose in the halls!" To Douglas' amazement, the T-1000/Lewis turned impassively and walked away, leaving him shouting soundlessly at the window.

Outside the hospital, the Terminator, John, and Kylie approached the guard gate on the Harley. They could see the guard inside look up at the sound of the engine. "Now remember, you're not gonna kill anyone, right?" John said.

"Right" the Terminator replied.

John looked at him. He wasn't convinced. "Swear" he said.

"What?" the Terminator wasn't sure what John meant.

"Just hold up your hand and say "I swear I won't kill anyone" Kylie said, holding her hand up, like she was being sworn in. the Terminator stared at her for a minute, then mimiced the gesture.

"I swear I will not kill anyone" he said, lowering his hand back down. Then he stopped the bike and got off. the guard, sensing trouble, had his gun drawn as he came out of the shack. the Terminator walked toward him, drawing his .45 smoothly.

BLAM!

He shot the guard accurately in the thigh. The guy dropped, screaming and clutching his leg. the Terminator kicked the guard's gun away, then smashed the phone in the shack with his fist. He pushed the button to raise the gate and walked back to the bike. he looked at John and Kylie."He'll live". the Terminator climbed back onto the bike and drive toward the hospital, heading down an ambulance ramp to an underground receiving area.

meanwhile...  
The attendants at the security checkpoint looked up at the monitor as someone entered the corridor. They saw Sarah, holding Silberman at syringe-point. Sarah spoke to them through an intercom on the wall.

"open it or he'll be dead before he hits the floor!". The attendants' adrenaline levels had just gone off the scale. The first attendant shook his head no. The amperage there was really high. The second attendant, a woman named Grace, keyed the intercom switch.

"There's no way, Connor. Let him go".

Silberman's face was the color of suet. "It won't work, Sarah. You're no killer. I don't believe you'd do it" he said.

"You're already dead Silberman, everybody here dies. You know I believe that. So don't _fuck_ with me!" Sarah hissed. "now open the damn door!" The attendants looked at one another, hesitant. one of them hit the solenoid button, making the far door unlock. In the lookout corridor, Sarah pushed Silberman ahead of her. The nearer, barred door had to be unlocked manually. Grace cautiously approached and nervously unlocked the door. "Step back!" Sarah snapped.

Grace did.

Sarah faced her and the other attendant, Robert. "down on the floor! _now_!"

They complied. She went through with Silberman, giving them a wide berth. She slowly started backing down the hall away from them, still holding her hostage. She couldn't believe she was actually pulling this off. At that moment, a third orderly lunged from around the corner, grabbing Sarah's syringe hand. she spun on the orderly and caught him across the throat with the nightstick. He lost interest fast, dropping to his knees and gagging. Silberman pulled away, screaming at the top of his lungs.

"Get her!"

The orderlies scrambled up as Sarah took off like a shot around the corner. One of them hit the panic button and alarms began to sound. In the isolation ward, the T-1000 was looking in at a very stoned attendant inside the nurses' station when the alarms shrieked through the halls. It reached into its chest and pulled out the 9mm pistol, heading for the security entrance.

in the maze of the vast hospital, in another corridor, Sarah flew down the hall, her bare feet slapping on the cold tiles. The orderlies charged after her. She was like an animal in a maze. She turned the corner, glancing off the wall, and sprinted on without slowing. She reached a steel door and tried to open it. locked. She could hear footsteps behind her. She fumbled with Douglas' keys, breathing hard. finally jamming the master key in. The orderlies were bearing down on her at full tilt.

Sarah got the door open, ran through, and slammed it. She turned the deadbolt knob just as the first orderly grabbed the latch on the other side. He was too late. Sarah saw them beyond the window, fumbling with their keys. She was already in another sally-port corridor. A jail-cell type barred door was between her and the corridors of the ward beyond. She sprinted to the walls of bars, jamming her key into the door. She unlocked and pulls open the door just as she heard the latch of the one she just came through being unlocked. She flung herself frantically through the barred door as the first orderly came through behind her. She slammed the bars shut.

CLANG!

Her keys were dangling from the lock on the other side from her. The orderly was racing at her, white-lipped with rage. She reached back through the bars, turned the key, and purposefully snapped it off in the lock. An instant later the big orderly slammed against the door, grabbing through the bars for her as she danced back just out of reach. He lunged against the steel bars, unbelievably pissed off. Sarah took off running, looking back at the frustrated orderlies. They were shouting at each other, unable to fit their keys into the lock -- The broken-off key tip made it impossible to get their keys in. Silberman was shouting at them.

"Go around, damn it! Go around!!" The orderlies ran back the way they came, and along a cross-corridor to another set of doors. Meanwhile, Sarah rounded a corner and saw the elevators ahead. Now she's home-free.

At a full-tilt sprint, she was nearly there when the elevator doors parted...

and the Terminator stepped out... his head swiveled to face her. Sarah reacted, stricken by the image from her worst nightmares. Her eyes widened as momentum carried her forward. Her bare feet slipped on the slick tile, and she slammed to the floor, staring up at the leather-clad figure with the shotgun. She lost all semblance of courage and some of her sanity. She wasn't even aware that she was screaming, or what she would be screaming if she could get the breath to do it. In what felt like slowed-down dream-time, Sarah scrambled back along the floor like a crab, spinning and clawing her way to her feet along the wall. She ran like the wind, like in her nightmare. If she had looked back she would've seen John and Kylie step warily out of the corridor behind the Terminator. The siblings, however, caught a glimpse of the fleeing Sarah and figured out instantly what happened.

"Mom!! wait!" John called, but Sarah didn't hear him. She had clicked fully into her own nightmare. John and Kylie took off running after Sarah. She was pelting down the long corridor, back the way she had come. as she reached an intersection with a cross-corridor, a white-clad figure blurred from that corridor. The orderly hit her in a flying tackle. She skidded across the floor, shrieking and struggling. The other two orderlies leapt into the fray.

"No! Help me! Damn it, it's gonna kill us all!!!" Sarah was screaming, shouting, pleading, trying to get them to understand what was coming. They grabbed her thrashing arms and legs, not even looking where the out-of-control woman was pointing... back along the corridor. They had pinned her to the cold tiles, a ring of faces above her. Silberman leaned down to her, holding a syringe with a heavy dose of trank. Sarah craned her neck and saw the dark silhouette of the Terminator coming up behind them. It was exactly her nightmare. She screamed in utter hopelessness. the Terminator, holding the shotgun in one hand, reached down and grabbed one of the orderlies with his other hand. He hurled the 200-pound guy against the far wall of the corridor.

SMACK!

The guy dropped to the floor. The other two orderlies reacted instantly, leaping onto the intruder. the Terminator seemed to disappear for a moment under the two big guys. Then there was an explosion of white-clad figures, as the orderlies were flung outward like they stepped on a land mine. One crashed through a window of safety glass and was caught before a two-story fall by the outer steel bars. The other one crashed through an office door, splintering it into kindling. While that was going on, Silberman had jumped to hold Sarah. He was grabbed by a roll of skin at the back of his neck and lifted like a cat.

The doctor felt his feet pedaling above the ground and turned to look into the expressionless face. and that as when it hit him. Sarah was right... this guy wasn't human. He felt the fabric of reality crumbling. Then he felt himself flying through the air. The wall smacked him, then the floor kicked him in the face. He decided to lie there a second. Sarah blinked, staring up at the figure looming over her. John and Kylie suddenly knelt next to her.

"Mom, are you okay?" Kylie asked. Sarah looks from the Terminator to John and Kylie. back to the Terminator.

_"Is this a nightmare? Or have i finally gone truly mad?"_ she thought.

Incredibly, the Terminator politely reached his hand down to her, offering to help her up. The last thing she ever expected to see.

"Come with me if you want to live" he said, repeating the words he'd said to Kylie earlier. The orderlies just stood there, stirring.

"It's all right, Mom. He's here to help" John said. Sarah, in a daze, took the huge hand in her shaking fingers. the Terminator lifts her to her feet. Kylie turned and saw a guard standing thirty feet away, on the other side of the walls of bars. John followed his sister's gaze, and felt that something wasn't right with the guy. the Terminator turned to look too. the T-1000 had its pistol in its hand, at its side. the Terminator pushed John and Kylie behind him. then they all started backing up slowly.

the T-1000 walked forward, reaching the bars. It didn't stop as its body divided like jello around the bars. as it squeezed itself through like metal playdough, its surface reformed perfectly on their side. it deformed and squeezed through like a viscous paste forced past an obstacle. meanwhile, Silberman had recovered enough to be sitting up and watching this. That faint snapping sound is his mind. CLANK! the T-1000's gun had caught against the bars... the only solid object. the T-1000 turned its wrist and tried again, slipping the gun endwise through the gap. Sarah was agape, not reacting. It had been a heavy day for her.

the Terminator suddenly raised the shotgun and started backing up faster. "Go! _Run_!" he said.

Sarah didn't need to be told twice. the T-1000 walked toward them, opening fire with the Browning Hi-Power. the Terminator straight-armed the 12-guage like a pistol and fired. The stunned orderlies flopped face down on the floor as the corridor wasfilled with high-velocity lead. One of them, stupidly running for the cross-corridor, got hit by the T-1000. the Terminator was hammered by several slugs, and the T-1000 was cratered by two buckshots hits. It staggered, but kept coming. In the craters were bright pools of mercury before the craters closed and resealed, disappearing in a second. the Terminator made it around the corner and broke into a run.

ahead, Sarah, John, and Kylie were already at the elevator. the Terminator ran in and Kylie slapped the button for "Garage Level". The doors started to close as the T-1000 cleared the corner. the Terminator slammed John and Kylie back against the side walls as the T-1000 charged at them, rapid firing the Browning. The rounds hit the steel doors as they closed. the T-1000 kept pumping them at the closing gap. Inside, they saw the backside of the doors denting with the hits that were punching holes in the other side. The Browning locked open, empty. the T-1000 dropped it without a glance back as the doors closed.

K-WHAM!

the T-1000 hit them a split second later. The elevator hadn't moved yet.

SSWWIKK!

a sword-like blade rammed through in between the doors, forcing them open. the Terminator jammed the shotgun through the widening gap, punching the muzzle right into the T-1000's face --

BOOM!!

the T-1000's head was blown apart by the blast. It was hurtled back as the doors closed. the T-1000 stood frozen outside the elevator. Its head, which was blown apart into two doughy masses lying on the shoulders, reformed quickly. There was no trace of the injury. It saw the closed door and jammed its hands between them, its fingertips becoming pry-bars. It pulled the doors apart with inhuman strength and leaped into the open shaft. It falls two floors and... in the elevator, the three humans and the machine hear a loud thump on the roof. the Terminator, reloading the shotgun, looked up. Sarah grabbed the .45 from his waistband and aimed it at the ceiling. then

CLANG!!

a swordlike shaft punched through the ceiling and speared down four feet into the elevator car, inches from Sarah's face. she opened fire,

BAM

BAM

BAM

right through the roof. Lighting-fast the lance withdrew and thrusted down again, slashing the Terminator's jacket, and missing John by inches. the Terminator chambered a round and

K-BOOM!

the 12-guage opened a hole in the ceiling. the Terminator rocked out in a fury of firing/cocking/firing as the metal shafts slashed down again and again. Kylie yelled in pain as one of them sliced open the back of her right shoulder. A few seconds later, the doors opened, and Sarah pulled John out as soon as the gap was wide enough. They emerged into the basement where the Harley was parked nearby. the Terminator, in a rearguard action, fired another blast through the ceiling and ran out, pulling Kylie along behind him. He then threw his leg over the Harley, kicked it to life with one powerful stroke and whipped something out of the inner pocket of his jacket. He threw it to John.

"a road flare!?" Kylie cried, her eyes widening. In the elevator, the T-1000 had bashed a hole in the ceiling big enough to... Pour itself through. a massive blob of mercury extruded from the opening. the mass dropped through the hole, down out of frame, then it forms the T-1000. it seemed to need just a second to get its mental act together after doing its king of taffy-pull with itself. It opened its eyes and saw – the Terminator, the shot gun held in his teeth, astride the roaring Harley twenty feet away. the Terminator twisted the throttle and popped the clutch. The back tire screamed on the concrete, and the front wheel lifted off the ground and the heavy bike launched in a thundering wheelie. the Terminator got off just before the bike hurtled into the elevator. the Harley slammed the T-1000 square and smashed it right through the back wall of the elevator.

the Terminator got to his feet just as John struck the flare on the concrete and tossed it. the Terminator caught the life flare with one hand, leveling the shotgun with the other. with his last round, he blew a big hole in the bike's gas tank. gas splashed everywhere, covering the struggling T-1000. then the Terminator tossed the flare.

KA-VOOOM!

the explosion knocked the Terminator backward off his feet, enveloping him in the fireball. He got up, smoking, and ran after John, Sarah, and Kylie toward the exit ramp. They are partway up the ramp when a blue-and-white hospital security car came screeching down the other way. Without breaking stride Sarah ran right at the car. It skidded to a shrieking halt. She was in the guy's face with the .45 in both hands.

"Out of the car!!" she yelled. the patrol guy was thinking what he could try when

BLAM!

she put a round through the glass next to his head. "_right now_!" The door opened and the guy was coming out with his hands up as the Terminator arrived. The cyborg flung the rent-a-cop out of the way and slid behind the wheel. Sarah and John got into the back seat as Kylie dove into the front passenger seat, seconds before the Terminator slammed the car into reverse and punched it, lighting up the tires on the slick ramp. He then handed the shotgun over his shoulder to John and told him to reload it. John pulled some shells from the pocket of his army jacket and started feeding them in. the Terminator powered backward up the ramp, scraping along one wall, barely in control. Meanwhile, the T-1000 was running at them out of the inferno below.

_"This guy won't quit!"_ Kylie thought, watching as the T-1000 shifted from chrome mode to cop-form as it ran. It sprinted up the ramp after the retreating car, gaining. the Terminator handed Kylie another magazine for the .45. She snatched it, dropped the empty one out, and slapped in the new one. cocks the slide. the car backed along the service driveway toward the security gate as John handed the shot gun back to the Terminator. the machine leaned out the window and took aim at the pursuer. the T-1000's face was right in the headlights as the Terminator fired, blowing a hole in its shoulder. shiny liquid metal was visible in the hole, which then closed. Kylie, half out the passenger window, opened fire.

The car crashed backward through the security barricade.

"Hang on" the Terminator said calmly as he cut the wheel, hard. the car slewed into a reverse 180, swapping ends with a screech. the T-1000 was almost on them. the Terminator punched it, causing the car accelerate forward. the T-1000 leaped, and landing on the trunk. Its hand was a metal crowbar, slammed down through the trunk lid. feet dragging on the pavement, it slammed its other hand down, punching another metal hook into the trunk lid, pulling itself up. the Terminator turned to Kylie. "drive" he said, heaving himself half out the driver's window. Kylie slapped her foot down on the throttle and steered from the passenger side. the T-1000, fully on the car now, held on with one hook-hand while it slammed the other into the back window, sweeping away the glass and missing John by inches as he ducked. It drew back for another swing, lunging forward as the Terminator whipped the shotgun over the roof of the car, firing point-blank. The shot hit the T-1000's arm just above the "hand", which anchored it to the car.

The 12-guage blew the arm apart, severing the hook-hand. the T-1000 tumbled backward off the accelerating car. John looked out the back window, his eyes wide. He saw the T-1000 roll to its feet and continue running. But it was dropping way behind. Kylie had the car floored and the liquid-metal killer wouldn't catch them on foot. John watched, in awe, as the "crowbar hand", stuck into the trunk right in front of him, reverted to the neutral polyalloy... a kind of mercury. the gray metal slid off the trunk of the car and fell onto the road to lie there in a quivering blob as the car sped off into the night. the T-1000, walking now, was watching the tail lights recede. It looked down at the liquid metal blob. next to it is the T-1000's shiny cop shoe. the mercury blob crawled and rejoined the main mass, disappearing into the "shoe".

Meanwhile, the security car blasted out of the darkness on a long stretch of moonlight highway. headlights off, the car punched a hole in the wind. Inside the speeding vehicle, the energy was still high. The icy air was blowing in the shattered windows as the Terminator drove the car easily by electronic night-vision.

"can you see anything?" Kylie asked.

"I see everything" the Terminator replied in a matter-of-fact tone.

"Cool" John murmured.

Sarah looked at the Terminator, still not quite believing what was happening. but this was a different Sarah than the waitress of 1984. She spent only a second or two dealing with the unbelievable. Then she turned to John.

"You okay?" she asked.

John nodded.

Sarah reached for John and he thought she was going to hug him. instead, she started to rub her hands over him, and he realized she was checking for injuries, very clinically the way a vet checks a dog for broken bones. He pulled away from her. he hated her always checking him, treating him like he might break, like some piece of rare china.

"I said I was okay" he said.

Sarah looked at him, exasperated and stern. "It was stupid of you to go there" she sneered. John stared at her, surprised. "damnit, John, you have to be smarter than that. You're too important! You _can't_ risk yourself, not even for me, do you understand? I can take care of myself, I was doing fine. geez, John. You almost got yourself killed". Kylie glanced in the rearview mirror and saw her brother's chin quiver. She knew he was a tough kid, but all he really wanted was for Sarah to love him. He hadn't had enough years on the planet yet to be the man of steel she demanded.

"I... we _had_ to get you out of that place... I'm sorry, I..." His face crumpled, and he started to cry.

Sarah gave him a cold stare. "_Stop it_! _right now_! You can't cry, John. Other kids can afford to cry. You can't".

"hey mom, lay off!" Kylie snapped. She could tell John was trying to be brave, he really was. Kylie felt like crying. "geez, John's just a kid, try to be understanding!! This is a lot of baggage for a 10 year old, so just… please, _back off_!" tears were welling up in her eyes.

the Terminator turned and saw the water leaking from her eyes. It didn't make any sense to him. he slowed the car and reached over to Kylie, putting his hand on her chin and turning her to face him.

"What is wrong with your eyes?" he asked. Kylie blushed and turned away, embarrassed.

"nothing" she mumbled as he pulled his hand away from her face. She turned to look out the window, her blush deepening. Sarah let her breath out, realizing how keyed up she was. She looked at the Terminator, giving him a wary once- over. "So what's your story?" she asked.

Back at the mental hospital, the cops have shown up, as they always did. there were black-and-white cop cars everywhere, and ambulances were arriving. two cops and an orderly were required to subdue poor Doctor Silberman, who was raving at the top of his lungs;

"... it was all true and we're all going to die!! he changed, I saw him change!!" It was quite pathetic. a nurse shot him up with a sedative, then they lead him away. the T-1000 walked, unperturbed, among the milling cops. no one noticed as It slipped into a cruiser and drove off into the night.

meanwhile, the Terminator drove steadily into the black night.

"This T-1000... what happens when you shoot it?" Sarah was asking.

"Ballistic penetration shocks it, but only for a few seconds" the Terminator answered. Sarah thought about that for a minute.

"Can it be destroyed?" Kylie asked.

"Unknown" the Terminator said, glancing at her. Kylie blushed, looking out the window. they rode along in silence for a few seconds.

Sarah saw something up ahead, some lonely neon in the blackness. "Pull in here. We have to ditch this car" she said. the Terminator nodded, pulling up at a rundown gas station with a buzzing neon sign and no one around. a sign in the window said closed Sundays. they continued around the building to the garage's back door, where the Terminator braked the lock on the roll-up door and raised it. Sarah pulled the security car in out of sight. the Terminator rolled the door down behind them. It was dark inside the gas station, so Sarah switched on the single drop-light.

Kylie and the Terminator looked at each other. the Terminator was shot-up and bleeding, and Kylie had a vicious slash through her shoulder, which had soaked her sleeve with blood.

"You look like handmade shit" Kylie told the machine.

"So do you".

"here, I found this in the office" John said, setting a first aid kit on a nearby table, along with some not-so-oily rags, a bottle of rubbing alcohol, a few small tools, and other makeshift odds and ends.

The Terminator turned to Kylie. "take your shirt off".

Kylie's eyes widened. "what?!"

"I have to disinfect your wound and sew it up" the machine replied.

Kylie nodded, blushing as she took off her shirt and jacket. _"good thing I'm wearing a bra"_ she thought as she sat down on a stool in front of the table. the Terminator moved to stand beside her, suturing her wound with some fine wire from the winding of an alternator. using a pair of needlenose pliers, he drew the wire through her pale skin with a delicate hand. A strange feeling overwhelmed Kylie as he did so. His fingers brushed against her skin every once in a while, and every time it happened, a warm, tingling feeling spread through Kylie's body.

like goosebumps.

She closed her eyes, her heart beating faster. _"what's wrong with me?!"_ she thought, a nervous feeling rising in her stomach as the Terminator continued to sew her up. She exhaled and closed her eyes again, tilting her head back slightly.

"having fun over there Kyles?"

Kylie's eyes shot open and she gave John a dirty look. He grinned at her, and she rolled her eyes.

"how do you know so much about this kind of stuff?" she asked the machine.

"I have detailed files on human anatomy" the Terminator said. Kylie turned slightly and stared into his face, which was inches away from hers. she blushed, feeling her heart hammering in her chest so loud and so hard, that she was convinced that the sound was echoing off the gas station walls. _"great"_ she thought sarcastically.

_"turned on by a machine"_.

Sarah stood nearby, observing the "surgery". she didn't like the Terminator being that close to her daughter to begin with, let alone him carving on her. and she was worried about Kylie, seeing the way her daughter reacted whenever the Terminator's hand made contact with her skin. It was almost as though she _enjoyed_ it!!

"I'll bet your files are _very_ detailed. makes you a more efficient killer, right?" Sarah said.

"Correct" the Terminator answered, handing Kylie her shirt and jacket. Kylie turned to face him just as he took his own shirt and jacket off. Kylie's jaw dropped, and she felt her eyes widen.

"hey Kylie, get your tongue back in your mouth".

Kylie glared at John. "don't make me hurt you" she sneered through gritted teeth.

John smirked and shrugged. He clearly wasn't bothered by his sister's threat.

The Terminator sat on the stool Kylie had just been in. John examined the machine's jacket, which was riddled with bullet holes. Kylie and Sarah stared in amazement. there were at least twenty bullet holes in him. in his back. arms. shoulders. fortunately they were all 9mm, meaning that the holes are small and the damage cosmetic.

"Does it hurt?" John asked.

"I sense injuries. The data could be called pain" the Terminator answered. Kylie sighed nervously as she started washing the bullet holes in his broad back with alcohol.

"Will those heal up?" Sarah asked.

the Terminator nodded.

"that's good. because if you can't pass for human, you won't be much good to us" she said.

Kylie sighed again as she reached into the bloody wounds with pliers, finding the copper-jacketed bullets, flattened against the armored endoskeleton. She slowly pulled them out. they clinked one by one into a glass.

"How long do you live? I mean, last, or whatever?" John asked.

"A hundred and twenty years on my existing power cell" the Terminator said. Kylie nodded, pulling out another slug.

CLINK.

the glass was nearly full of flattened bullets. She began to sew the holes closed with a few wire sutures. John watched in quiet amazement, the wondering what his sister liked so much about the machine.

"Can you learn? So you can be... you know. more human. Not such a dork all the time" John asked, getting another dirty look form Kylie.

the Terminator turned toward him. "My CPU is a neural-net processor... a learning computer. but Skynet presets the switch to "read-only" when we are sent out alone".

"Doesn't want you thinking too much, huh?" Sarah said, a cynical tone to her voice.

"No".

"Can we reset the switch?" John asked.

Kylie watched nervously as Sarah cut into the Terminator's scalp at the base of his skull with an x-acto knife. his voice was calmly directing Sarah as she spread the bloody incision and located the maintenance port for the CPU in the chrome skull beneath.

"Now open the port cover" the Terminator instructed. She wiped away the blood and used the garage-mechanic's air tools to unscrew the port cover. her hands were covered with blood, like a surgeon's. "Hold the CPU by its base tab. Pull". Following the instructions, Sarah reached in with a pair of tweezers and pulled --

there was a burst of static and the Terminator's screen went black. Sarah, John, and Kylie stood there, looking at what Sarah had removed. a reddish- brown ceramic rectangle with a connector on one end. about the size and shape of a domino. on close inspection it appeared to be made up of small cubes connected together. It was identical to the shattered one in the vault at Cyberdyne Systems. It was the brain of a Terminator. John walked around Terminator and looks at his face. Eyes open, the machine was completely inert.

dead.

John snapped his fingers in front of the Terminator's face.

No reaction.

meanwhile, Sarah examined the CPU chip.

"Can you see the pin switch?" Kylie asked. Sarah ignored her. she looked at Terminator, then back at the chip. then she set it on the work table and picked up a small sledge hammer. John looked over and realized what she was about to do. He ran at her as the sledge was whistling down.

"No!!!!"" He cried, slapping his hand down over the chip. Sarah barely stopped the sledge before smashing his fingers.

"Out of the way, John!"

"No! Don't kill him!" Kylie pleaded.

"_It_, Kylie. Not him, _It_". Sarah said.

John sighed "Alright, _it_! We need _it_!" he kept his hand right where it is.

"We're better off by ourselves" Sarah said.

"But it's the only proof we have to the future... about the war and all that" John said, trying to prove his point.

Sarah shook her head. "I don't trust it! These things are hard to kill, John, believe me, I know. We may never have this opportunity again".

"Look, Mom, if John's supposed to ever be this great leader, you should start listening to his leadership ideas once in a while. 'Cause if you won't, nobody else will" Kylie said, putting her arm around John's shoulders. _"i will. no matter what"_ she thought. She would _always_ stand by John. Sarah sighed and nodded reluctantly. Kylie picked up the chip and studied it minutely. Then she took a pin and moved the almost invisible switch to the other position. It was now in "write" mode. then she grimaced as she inserted the wafer back into the slot in Terminator's skull. The Terminator came back to life instantly, in a burst of static. Kylie still stood behind him in the mirror.

"Was there a problem?" the Terminator asked.

John glanced sheepishly at Sarah, then smiled at Terminator. "no problem. none whatsoever".

* * *

**well how was that? i don't think i've ever worked on one chapter for so long!**

**Terminator:** "i helped"

**Me_*rolls eyes*_:** yeah, by hovering over me while i type! which, i must say, is pretty cool

**Terminator:** "..."

**Me:** "well, please review, and i hope you enjoyed this one. remember, the Terminator knows where you live!!

**Terminator:** "no i don't"

**Me:** "sshhh!"


	4. Getting supplies

**hey everyone, i'm back with a new chapter!! YAY!!!! _so_ sorry it took so long, but it takes a while to edit these chapters. plus i haven't really been on the computer much lately. but anywho, here's chapter 4, i hope you enjoy it!! and there's even a little bit of TerminatorxKylie, but not much.**

**DISCLAIMER: i _do not_ own T2 or any of its characters. i only own Kylie Connor**

* * *

John was sleeping, lying on a pile of rags next to a stack of tires. the lights were off. Sarah sat nearby, cross legged, her back against the wall, the .45 cradled in her lap. She looked weary, but she wouldn't allow herself to sleep with the Terminator present. By the office windows, in a slash of moonlight, was the Terminator. He stood silent and still, watching the night. Only his eyes moved, tracking with the occasional car passing on the road. his figure silhouetted and still.

Kylie couldn't sleep. She glanced at John, who was a few feet away from her. then she glanced at Sarah. She looked like she was going to nod off at any time. Kylie slowly stood up and walked over to the Terminator.

"uh, hi" she said softly.

The machine slowly turned to look at her. "you should be resting. It will be morning soon".

Kylie sighed, leaning against the window. "I can't sleep".

"humans need to sleep".

Kylie nodded. "yeah, but some humans have trouble sleeping"

"why?"

she shrugged. "I don't know. Some of us just can't relax enough to sleep". the Terminator studied Kylie for a minute. he slowly reached out and traced his finger along her face, just above her eyelid.

"what is that?"

Kylie swallowed nervously. "what, the dark stuff?"

"yes".

"oh, it's eye shadow. Women use it all the time"

"what does it do?"

Kylie blushed. "nothing. It's just to look nice". the Terminator kept his hand on her face and stared at her. Kylie stared right back, her heart pounding in her chest. She felt her face getting redder and redder. _"what's the matter with me?!"_ she thought.

**_"you know exactly what's wrong with you"_** a little voice in her head said.

Kylie sighed. _"oh great, it's that stupid little voice!"_

**_"I'm your conscience"_**

_"yeah, I know, and you're real annoying too!"_

**_"Kylie, I'm here to tell you exactly what your problem is. Even though you're too stubborn to admit it"_**

_"ok then, what's my problem?"_

**_"you like him"_**

_"who, the Terminator?"_

**_"yes"_**

_"what?! No way, that's ridiculous!"_

**_"but true"_**

Kylie sighed again, ignoring her conscience.

"Kylie?"

she jumped and looked at the Terminator, who was still standing beside her. she frowned when she noticed that he'd moved his hand away from her face.

"yeah?"

"are you allright?"

Kylie nodded, forcing a smile. "uh, yeah. I'm fine". She yawned.

"rest now. It will be daylight in 4 hours and 26 minutes".

Kylie nodded. "yeah, ok. goodnight".

a few hours later, daylight streamed in the dusty windows. the Terminator had not moved. faithful machine sentinel. He turned at a sound. John stirred, waking up. He squinted into the sunlight. Sarah was still awake. Kylie slowly got up, wincing at the pain in her shoulder. A little later, John, Kylie, and the Terminator walked to an old Chevy pickup parked behind the garage. The day was clear but windy. Dust devils chased themselves behind the place. The pickup was locked, but the Terminator broke the side window with his fist and opened the door. He, John, and Kylie climbed in. the Terminator had this trick (which you could do too if you had servo-driven steel fingers) where he smashed the cowl around a steering column with one blow from the palm of his hand. When it shattered, he stripped it away with a single move, and then turned the stub of the lock-mechanism with his fingertips. That started the vehicle. It had taken about three seconds. In fact, he did it so quickly, the truck was running by the time John flipped down the sun visor.

A set of keys dropped out and John caught them. He smirked, dangling them in front of the Terminator's eyes.

"Are we learning yet?" he asked. Sarah came out just then. She'd found a mechanic's coverall inside, used, but fairly clean. It didn't fit her too well, but it was better than the stuff from the hospital. She was still barefoot. The sun, which she hadn't seen in months, hurt her eyes. the Terminator, John, and Kylie pulled up in the pickup, allowing her to get in.

"We need to get as far from the city as possible" the Terminator said.

"just head south" Sarah mumbled. The pickup roared through light traffic down a long stretch of highway. They set two abreast on the bench seat, with Sarah and John in the back. It looked like some improbable family on a car trip. Sarah leaned over to get a look at the speedometer. "Keep it under sixty-five. we can't afford to be pulled over". The Terminator backed off the throttle slightly.

"Affirmative" he replied.

"No, no, no. You gotta listen to the way people talk" John said. "See, you don't say 'Affirmative', or some shit like that. You say... 'no problemo'". the Terminator nodded, filing away the information. Sarah was ignoring the lesson, lost in thought. "and If someone comes off to you with an attitude, you say 'eat me'" John continued.

Kylie grinned. "and if you wanna shine them on, it's 'Hasta la vista, baby'".

"Hasta la vista, baby?" the Terminator repeated.

"Yeah, or 'later, dickwad' Or if someone gets upset, you say 'chill out'. or you can do combinations" John said .

"Chill out, dickwad".

"That's great! See, you're getting it" Kylie said, smiling at the machine.

"No problemo" the Terminator said. Kylie sighed in frustration, feeling her heart beat fast. A few miles down the road, they turned into a sleazy fast-food stand near a gas pump. Picnic tables were set up at the side of the food stand. A family sat at one, children playing and running about. The pickup truck stopped at the gas pump.

Sarah turned to John. "You got any cash?" John pulled what was left of his Ready Teller money from his pocket.

"Only a couple hundred bucks. I'll give you half".

Sarah grabbed all of it, peeled off a twenty, and handed it to John. "Get some food" she said, opening the truck door and stepping out. John turned to the Terminator.

"No sense of humor" he mumbled as they walked to the ordering window. "And that's another thing. you could lighten up a bit, yourself. this severe routine is getting old. smile once in a while".

"smile?" the Terminator questioned.

"Yeah, smile. You know. People smile, right? watch" John said, heading to the order window. "Hi. Nice place you got here. How's business?" he asked, smiling broadly at the woman inside.

"Gimme a break" the woman muttered, stone-faced.

"Okay, Bad example" John said, looking around. "Over there, look" he pointed at three teenage guys standing at a drinking fountain nearby. One of them had said something funny and the others were laughing, grinning. "like that" John said. the Terminator studied the motion for a minute and tried it. The result was dismal. a rictus-like curling of the lip. the Terminator's next effort was a marginal improvement. "I don't know, maybe you could practice in front of a mirror or something" John said.

"hey guys, what are you, _whoa_!" Kylie walked over to them and frowned in disgust when she saw the Terminator's 'smile'. "geeze John, we're trying to teach him how to be more human, not scare people away".

A few minutes later, Sarah and John were eating cheeseburgers and fries, sitting in the truck. They were parked away from the other families, at the end of the gravel parking area. the Terminator was pouring coolant into the radiator, Kylie standing beside him. Sarah was deep in thought, turning and turning the whole thing in her brain. John, unable to deal with her silence, went around to where the Terminator was working. John saw two kids playing with machine-gun water pistols nearby, viciously squirting each other.

"You're dead!" the first kid cried.

"Am not!"

"Are so!"

John, Kylie, and the Terminator watched them rolling on the ground in a fight to the death. Sarah rounded the front of the truck, and saw the kids too. John sighed, solemn. "We're not gonna make it, are we? people, I mean" he said softly, looking up at the cyborg.

"It is in your nature to destroy yourselves" the Terminator said.

John nodded, depressed. "Yeah. Major drag, huh?"

Kylie put her hand on his shoulder. "_total_ drag".

"I need to know how Skynet gets built. Who's responsible?" Sarah said, not having heard what her kids had just said.

"The man most directly responsible is Miles Bennet Dyson, Director of Special Projects at the Cyberdyne Systems Corporation" the Terminator said.

"Why him?" Kylie asked.

"In a few months he creates a revolutionary type of microprocessor" the Terminator said.

"then what?" Sarah asked, impatient.

the Terminator closed the hood and got into the truck as he spoke. "In two years, Cyberdyne will become the largest supplier of military computer systems. All stealth bombers are upgraded with Cyberdyne computers, becoming fully unmanned. Afterward, they fly with a perfect operational record.

"uh huh, _great_. Then those fat fucks in Washington figure, what the hell, let a computer run the whole show, right?" Sarah said angrily as she, John, and Kylie climbed in the truck.

"basically" the Terminator replied, starting the engine and backing out onto the road. "The Skynet funding bill is passed. The system goes on-line August 4th, 1997. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn, at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. eastern time, August 29. In a panic, they try to pull the plug".

"and Skynet fights back" Kylie said.

"Yes. It launches its ICBMs against their targets in Russia".

"Why attack Russia?" John asked.

"Because Skynet knows the Russian counter-strike will remove its enemies here" the Terminator said.

"geeze. How much do you know about Dyson?" Sarah asked the Terminator.

"I have detailed files".

"I want to know everything. What he looks like. where he lives. _everything_" Sarah said.

Kylie sighed, her mind spinning a little. _"great, Skynet's going online in only 2 years. and on Michael Jackson's birthday too"_.

The next day, at the Dyson house…  
Miles Dyson sat at the huge desk in his study. He was deep in thought, tapping away at the keyboard of his home computer terminal. Next to the desk were racks of sophisticated gear. On a Sunday morning, when most men are relaxing, spending time with their families, Dyson is hard at work. He was in deep concentration, his mind prowling the labyrinth of his new microprocessor. A woman entered the room just then, soundlessly coming up behind him. He didn't hear her. His wife, Tarissa, extended her tongue and traced it down the back of his neck. He smiled and turned to kiss her good morning. She was still in her bathrobe, holding coffee. Miles had been up for hours. He turned and went back to work, forgetting instantly that Tarissa was standing there. She watched him work, the arcane symbols moving across the computer screen. She sighed in frustration.

"You going to work all day?" she asked.

"I'm sorry, baby. This thing is just kicking my ass. I thought we had it with this one..." Miles sighed and pointed to a metal box on his desk, about two feet long. an assembly of small cubes. It looked like a dinosaur version of Terminator's CPU. "... but the output went to shit after three seconds. I'm thinking now it's the way I'm matrixing the command hierarchies...".

"You need a break. You'll see it clear when you come back" Tarissa said.

"I can't".

"Miles, it's Sunday. You promised to take the kids to Raging Waters today" Tarissa said.

"Oh, I can't, honey. I'm on a roll here". He took her hands, a childlike excitement in his face. He wanted so badly to share the almost orgasmic thrill of discovery, the satisfaction of creation. "Baby, this thing is going to blow 'em all away. It's a neural-net process…"

"I know, You told me. It's a neural-net processor. It thinks and learns like we do. It's superconducting at room temperature. Other computers are pocket calculators by comparison". she sighed and pulled away from him. "But why is that so damn important, Miles? I really need to know, 'cause I feel like I'm going crazy here, sometimes!".

"I'm sorry, honey, it's just that I'm _this_ close" Miles said, holding up his thumb and index finger, a fraction of an inch apart. Tarissa picked up the prototype. It didn't look like much. "Imagine a jetline with a pilot that never makes a mistake, never gets tired, never shows up to work with a hangover" Miles said, tapping the prototype. "Meet the pilot".

Tarissa was on her last nerve. "Why did you marry me, Miles? Why did we have these two children? You don't need us. Your heart and your mind are in _here_". she stared at the metal box in her hands. "But it doesn't love you like we do".

Miles took the anodized box from her hands and set it down. Then he put his hands on her shoulders and kissed her gently. "I'm sorry" he said quietly. Tarissa glanced over his shoulder. She nodded her head toward the doorway to the study. Dyson turned and saw their two kids standing there. Danny, 6, and Blythe, 4, looked rumpled in their PJs. Miles wilted at their hopeful expressions.

"how about spending some time with your other babies?" Tarissa said. Miles grinned. The forces of darkness have lost this round. He held out his hands and his kids ran to him, cheering.

later that day in, the desert northwest of Calexico...  
Burning under the sun like a hallucination. Heat shimmered the image, mirage-like. the Terminator turned the pickup off the paved road and barreled along a roadbed of sand and gravel, trailing a huge plume of dust. A sign at the turnoff said: Charon Mesa 2 mi Calexico 15 mi. ahead was a pathetic oasis of humanity in the vast wasteland, a couple of aging house-trailers, surrounded by assorted junk vehicles and desert-style trash. There was a dirt airstrip behind the trailers, and a stripped Huey helicopter sitting on block nearby. The truck rolled to a stop in a cloud of dust. The place looks deserted. The door to the nearest trailer banged in the wind.

"Stay in the truck" Sarah said. a dark figure stood nearby, with an AK-47 trained on the pickup as Sarah got out. She approached the trailer. "Enrique? usted aqui?" She heard

KACHANK!

behind her and spun around, whipping out her .45 in one motion. Enrique Salceda stood behind a rusting jeep, a 12-gauge pump trained on her. He was in his mid-forties, a tough Guatemalan with a weathered face and heavy mustache. He wore cowboy boots and a flak vest, no shirt.

"you pretty jumpy, Connor" he said, His fierce face breaking into a broad grin. The shotgun dropped to his side as he walked toward her. When he reached her he, hugged her, then stepped back. "Good to see you, Connor. I knew you'd make it back here sooner or later". He grinned at John and Kylie as they stepped from the truck, the Terminator right behind them. "Oye, Big John! Kylita! Que pasa? Who's your very large friend?"

"He's cool, Enrique. He's... uh... this is…" John started.

"my boyfriend!"

everyone turned to Kylie, who blushed as soon as the words left her mouth.

"your boyfriend? Isn't he a little old for you Kylita?" Enrique asked, frowning slightly.

Kylie shook her head. "no, of course not. His name's, uh…" she hesitated, trying to think of something to say. "Arnold! Yeah, his name's Arnold. He's, uh, he's a professional bodybuilder". She forced a smile. _"man, that sounds so ridiculus!"_ Kylie thought. "Arnold, this is Enrique". the Terminator smiled. sort of.

Enrique squinted at him. "hmmm. Okay. But Franco's not going to be happy about this". Kylie rolled her eyes. "Yolanda! Get out here, we got company. And bring some fucking tequila!" Enrique yelled. A thin Guatemalan kid, Franco, eighteen or so, came out of the trailer with the AK-47, followed by Enrique's wife, Yolanda. She had three younger children with her, from a five-year-old girl, Juanita, to a year-and-half-old boy. She waved at John and Kylie. They exchanged greetings in Spanish.

"Kylie? Is that you?"

Kylie cringed and slowly turned to the boy standing by her. she was surprised to find that Franco had actually gotten to be pretty cute since she saw him last.

"hey Franco" she said dryly.

"oh Kylita, you're even more beautiful then the last time I saw you!".

"flattery will get you nowhere dude. never has, never _will_. kay?"

before Franco could say anything, Kylie turned away, ignoring him.

"So, Sarahlita, you getting famous, you know that? all over the damn TV" Enrique was saying to Sarah, ripping the cap off the tequila bottle. The two-year-old toddled over to the Terminator and grabbed his pants, sliming them with drool. the machine looked down at the tiny kid, fascinated. What was it? He picked up the child with one huge hand. looked at it, turning it different ways, studying it. then he set it down. the kid waddled off, a little dizzy

"Honey, take Pacolito. Thanks, baby" Enrique said to Yolanda. She handed him the tequila and took the child. Enrique took a long pull from the Cuervo bottle. "Drink?" he asked the Terminator. the machine didn't answer, but Sarah grabbed the bottle and took a long pull. She lowered it without expression. Her eyes didn't even water.

"I just came for my stuff. And I need clothes, food, and one of your trucks" she said, getting right to the point.

"hey, how about the fillings out of my fucking teeth while you're at it?" Enrique said, grinning.

"_now_, Enrique" Sarah said slowly. She turned to John, Kylie, and the Terminator. "You three are on weapons detail".

Behind the trailers there was an aging and rusted Caterpillar sitting behind one of the trailers. John expertly backed it toward the Terminator, who was holding one end of a piece of heavy chain which disappeared into the sand.

"Hook it on" Kylie instructed. the Terminator hooked the chain onto the towhook on the back of the tractor. John hit the throttle and the Cat churned its treads, pulling some massive load. A six-by-eight foot sheet of steel plate moveed slowly under six inches of sand. John and Kylie dragged it far enough to reveal... a rectangular hole in the ground. Like the mouth of a tomb. The siblings dropped down from the tractor and walked to the hole.

"One thing about our mom... she always plans ahead" John said.

from inside the weapons cache, Sunlight slashed down into a cinder-block room, less than six feet wide but over twenty long. Sand spilled down the steps. The walls were lined with guns. John and Kylie preceded the Terminator into Sarah's weapons cache. Rifles, pistols, rocket launchers, mortars, RPGs, radio gear. At the far end, boxes containing ammo, grenades, etc. were stacked to the ceiling. the Terminator got real alert. scanning, wondering where to begin. he picked up a MAC-10 machine pistol. racked the bolt.

"Excellent" he said.

"Yeah, I thought you'd like this place" John said.

back out on the compound, Sarah emerged from a trailer. She had changed clothes. Boots, black fatigue pants, T-shirt. shades. She looked hard. Enrique was nearby, packing food and other survival equipment with Yolanda. He looked up as Sarah approached, and slapped the side of a big four-by four Bronco next to him. "This is the best truck, but the water pump is blown. You got the time to change it out?"

Sarah nodded. "Yeah. I'm gonna wait till dark to cross the border". she pulled him away from Yolanda. "Enrique, it's dangerous for you here. You get out tonight, too, okay?"

"Yeah, Saralita. Sure" he said, grinning. "Just drop by any time and totally fuck up my Life". She slapped him on the shoulder.

In the weapons cache, the Terminator returned from carrying out several cases of ammo. John and Kylie were selecting rifles from a long rack. "See, we grew up in places like this, so I just thought it was how people lived... riding around in helicopters. learning how to blow shit up" John was saying as he grabbed an AK-47 and racked the bolt with a practiced action. He inspected the receiver for wear. He didn't like what he saw, and put it back. His movement was efficient. professional. uninterested. Kylie moved in a similar fashion.

"Then, when Mom got busted, John and i got put in regular school. The other kids were, like, into Nintendo" she said. the Terminator found a Vietnam-era 'blooper' M-79 grenade launcher. a very crude, but effective weapon. He opened the breech and inspected the bore. "Are you ever afraid?" Kylie asked. the Terminator paused for a second. the thought never occurred to him. He searched his mind for the answer...

"No". he slung the M-79 and started looking for the grenades.

"Not even of dying?" John said.

"No".

"You don't feel any emotion about it one way or the other?"

"No. I have to stay functional until my mission is complete. Then it doesn't matter".

John was idly spinning a Sig Saur 9mm pistol on his finger... backwards and forwards like Bat Masteron. "Yeah. I have to stay functional too. I'm too important". the Terminator pulled back a canvas tarp, revealing a squat, heavy weapon with six barrels clustered in a blunt cylinder. Chain-ammo was fed from a canister sitting next to it. a G.E. mini-gun. the most fearsome anti-personnel weapon of the Vietnam era. the Terminator hefted it up, looking at John and Kylie.

"It's definitely you" Kylie said, smiling. A little later, Sarah and John had their weapons and supply selections laid out on two battered picnic tables for cleaning and packing. maps, radios, documents, explosives, detonators... just the basics. Sarah was field- stripping and cleaning guns, very methodical. There was no wasted motion. not far away, the Terminator was working on the Bronco. The machine was greasy up to his elbows, lying on his back under the engine compartment, ratcheting bolts into places on the new water pump. Kylie was laying on her stomach next to him, halfway underneath the truck. "There was this one guy that was kinda cool. He taught John and me about engines. Mom screwed it up, of course. sooner or later she'd always tell them about Judgment Day and John being this world leader and that'd be all she wrote". Kylie thought she was being causal, but her longing for some kind of parental connection was obvious.

"Torque wrench please" the Terminator said.

"Here. I wish I could've met my real dad".

"You will".

"Yeah. I guess so. My mom says when I'm, like, 53, I think, John sends him back through time to 1984. But right now he hasn't even been born yet. man, it messes with your head. Mom and him were only together for one night, but she still loves him, I guess. I see her crying sometimes. She denies it totally, of course. Like she says she got something in her eye" she hesitated. "I mean, I know he's not my _real_ dad, since I'm adopted. But I've always thought of him as my dad anyway. I guess cause he's the only one I've ever known". The Terminator slowly turned to look at her. Kylie blushed, feeling her heart beating faster again. She slowly slid closer to him, leaning forward. _"I can't believe I'm doing this!"_ she thought, leaning closer to the machine. She was about to kiss him when…

"Kyles, there you are!"

"ah!" Kylie jumped, banging her head on the truck. "ow!" she groaned, sliding out from underneath the vehicle. She glared at John. "_what_?!" she snapped, rubbing the back of her head.

John laughed. "was I interrupting something?"

"_no_! now what do you want you little creep?"

John smiled. He always found it funny when his sister was mad. "_relax_, I just wanted to tell you that Franco's looking for you". Kylie sighed. "don't worry, I've got things covered here" John said, sliding underneath the truck beside the Terminator. Kylie groaned and hesitantly walked over to Franco. John sighed, glad to get some shade from the sun.

the Terminator looked at him. "Why do you cry?"

"You mean people? I don't know, we just cry. You know. When it hurts" John said.

"Pain causes it?"

"Uh-unh, no, it's different... It's when there's nothing wrong with you, but you hurt anyway. You get it?" John said, not really explaining it well.

"No" the Terminator said as he and John got from underneath the Bronco. The machine reached through the open window and turned the ignition key. the engine caught with a roar.

"Alriight!! my man!" John cheered.

"No problemo" the Terminator replied. John grinned and did a victorious thumbs up. the Terminator imitated the gesture awkwardly. John laughed and made him try the move again. Sarah, across the compound, paused in her work to watch John and the Terminator.

SARAH'S POV...  
"Watching John with the machine, it was suddenly so clear. the Terminator would never stop, it would never leave him... it would always be there. And it would never hurt him, never shout at him or get drunk and hit him, or say it couldn't spend time with him because it was too busy. And it would die to protect him and Kylie. Of all the would-be fathers who came and went over the years, this _thing_, this _machine_, was the only one who measured up. In an insane world, it was the sanest choice. But I do worry about Kylie. I'm starting to get the impression that she likes the Terminator a little too much".

NORMAL POV...  
Sarah clenched her jaw and went grimly back to work... a strong woman made hard and cold by years of hard choices.

several miles away, a police cruiser was parked off the side of a quiet, empty road on the outskirts of Los Angeles. A ribbon of traffic moved steadily by on a freeway in the distance. nothing stirred around the cruiser except some pump-jacks sucking the earth on the hill behind it. In the cruiser, the T-1000 sat. In the rear-view it saw a bike cop pulling onto the shoulder behind it. The big Kawasaki 1100 idled up next to the T-1000, still seated in the cruiser. "Howdy. I saw you pulled over here earlier. everything okay?" the cop asked.

"Everything's fine. Thanks for checking" the T-1000 said, slowly getting out of the car. "Since you're here, though, can I talk to you a second...?"

Meanwhile, at the compound, Sarah sat at the picnic table. The weapons were cleaned and her work was done. She hadn't slept in twenty-four hours and she seemed to have the weight of the whole world on her shoulder. She drew her knife from its belt sheath, and Idly started to carve something on the table top... the letter "N". not far away, John and the Terminator were packing the Bronco for the trip. Sarah looked up from her carving, thinking. She watched Enrique's kids playing nearby... wrestling with a mutty dog and loving it. Sarah watched Yolanda walking her toddler by her hands. She looked over at John. loading guns and supplies. Sarah's head drooped, and she closed her eyes.

"…and that's what happened the first time dad showed me how to shoot a gun" Franco was saying.

"uh huh" Kylie mumbled distractedly, not paying any attention to the boy. She was focusing on a certain machine. Franco sighed in frustration.

"Kylie, what did I do wrong?"

Kylie ignored him.

he grabbed her shoulder. "_Kylie_!"

she wheeled around and glared at him. "_what_!?"

"what did I ever do to you?"

Kylie frowned. "what? What are you talking about?"

"what did I ever do to make you hate me?"

Kylie shook her head. "I don't hate you Franco, you're just… sort of annoying, that's all".

"annoying?" Franco said, a flash of hurt in his eyes.

"_yes_, because you never leave me alone! Every time mom used to bring me and John here, you always pestered me. I'm just sick of it, ok? I know you've had a crush on me for a long time, but…"

"I don't have a crush on you Kylie" Franco said.

Kylie frowned. "what? Then why do you always bug me?"

Franco sighed, blushing. "I don't have a crush on you anymore because I've been in love with you for so long. I love you Kylita".

Kylie's jaw dropped. "_wow, I did not see that coming!"_ she thought.

Franco sighed. "but I guess it doesn't matter now. what with you having a boyfriend and all". He looked at the Terminator, a look of disgust crossing his face. "what do you see in him anyway Kylie? He doesn't really seem to have any… personality. And besides, he looks way too old for you anyway". Kylie clenched her teeth, forcing herself not to punch Franco's lights out.

"look Franco, I'm sorry that I don't love you back, ok? And to answer your question, I don't know. There's just something about him that I like… a lot".

Sarah woke up, breathing heavily. all was quiet and normal. The children were still playing nearby. less than fifteen minutes had gone by. bathed in sweat, Sarah sat hunched over the table. every muscle was shaking. she was gasping, struggling to breath. She ran her hand through her hair which was soaked with sweat. she can escape from the hospital, but she can't escape from the madness which haunts her. She looked down at the words she had carved on the table, amid the scrawled hearts and bird-droppings. They were: "no fate". Something changed in her eyes. She slammed her knife down in the table top, embedding it deeply in the words. then got up suddenly and strode across the compound with grim purpose. She carried a small nylon pack and a CAR-15 assault rifle. Her face was an impassive mask.

she had become a terminator.

John and Kylie both looked up in time to see Sarah throw the rifle behind the seat of their stolen pickup, jump in, and start it. She slammed it in gear.

Enrique walked up to John, Kylie right behind him. "She said you go south with him..." he pointed at the Terminator. "... tonight, like you planned. She will meet you tomorrow in..."

but John was moving, running after Sarah. "Mom!! Wait!!"

she looked in the rear-view mirror, but didn't slow down.

Back at the compound a minute later, John, Kylie, and the Terminator pondered the message carved into the top of the picnic table. Sarah's knife was still embedded there. "No fate. No fate but what we make. our father told her this... I mean, I made him memorize it, up in the future, as a message to her… never mind. Okay, the whole thing goes 'The future is not set. There is no fate but what we make for ourselves'" John said.

"She intends to change the future somehow" the Terminator said.

"I guess, yeah…" John snapped his fingers as it hit him. "Oh _shit_!!"

"Dyson" the Terminator said.

Kylie's eyes widened as the realization hit her too. "Yeah, gotta be! Miles Dyson! She's gonna blow him away!"

John motioned to Kylie and the Terminator, breaking into a run. "Come on, Let's go. LET'S GO!!"

Kylie's heart pounded as she followed her brother. She hoped they'd be able to make it in time, before it was too late.

* * *

**well, how was that? whew, these chapters are _long_!! and i'm going to get started on the next chapter today, so hopefully i'll have it posted soon. anyway, i hope you enjoyed this one, and don't forget to review!!!**

**-FreddysNightmare1984**


	5. Dyson

**HELLO EVERYONE! i know it's been a long time, and i apologize for not updating sooner. there's really no excuse, and i'm sorry. but don't worry, i _will_ continue this story. i'm so glad people are still reading this, and please review!**

**DISCLAIMER: i _do not_ own T2 or any of it's characters. i only own Kylie**

* * *

Tracking with the Bronco, the Terminator, John, and Kylie head toward L.A. "This is tactically dangerous" the Terminator said.

"Drive faster" John mumbled worriedly.

"The T-1000 has the same files that I do. It could anticipate this move and reacquire you at Dyson's house"

"I don't care. We've gotta stop her" John said.

"Killing Dyson might actually prevent the war" the Terminator said.

"I don't care! There's gotta be another way. Haven't you learned _anything_? Haven't you figured out why you can't kill people?" John said, getting frustrated. The Terminator was still stumped. "Look, maybe you don't care if you live or die. But everybody's not like that! Okay? We have feelings. We hurt. We're afraid. You gotta learn this stuff, man, I'm not kidding. It's important" John explained.

Kylie sighed as they drove. She could see the lights of the city ahead.

...

The Dyson house was high-tech and luxurious. Lots of glass. Dyson's study was lit bluish with the glow of his computer monitors. He was at the terminal, working. Where else? He was clearly in a long shot from an embankment behind the house. A dark figure moved close to the house. It was Sarah. She raised the CAR-15 rifle and began screwing the long heavy cylinder of a sound-suppresser onto the end of the barrel.

inside, Dyson's kids, Danny and Blythe, were playing in the halls with a radio- controlled off-road truck. Danny drove and Blythe scampered after it, trying to catch it. They stopped in the hall outside Dyson's study and saw him working at his terminal. Danny put a finger to his lips, shushing Blythe. His expression was mischievous. With the silencer in place, Sarah eased back the bolt and then slipped it forward, chambering a .223 round. Then she lied down on the embankment. Her cheek was pressed against the cool rifle-stock. she slid one hand slowly forward to brace the weapon, taking the weight on her elbow. Her other hand slipped knowingly to the trigger. Her expression was cold, impassive. She looked through the scope at the man in the house. She felt nothing as she raised the rifle.

in his study Dyson sat, in deep thought. The rhythmic sounds of keys as he worked. Symbols on the screen shifted. On his back a glowing red dot appeared. It was the target dot of Sarah's laser designator. It moved silently up his back toward his head.

Sarah's eye was at the night-scope. her finger tightened on the trigger, taking out the slack. She took a deep breath and held it. She slowly Adjusted her position minutely.

The laser dot jiggled on the back of Dyson's neck and then rose, centering on the back of his skull. Danny's Bigfoot truck roars toward Dyson. Thump. It hit Dyson's foot. He jerked, startled, and looked down as -

POP!

His monitor screen was blown out spraying his with glass. He jerked back, utterly shocked... and spun to see the huge hole blown through the window behind him. This saved him as

K-THUMP! -

the second shot blew the top of his high-backed chain into an explosion of stuffing an inch from his head. Instinctively he dove to the carpet as -

BLAM

BLAM

BLAM

- rounds blasted through the window, tearing into his desk and computer, blowing his keyboard into shrapnel. With the monitor screen blown out, the room was in darkness. Sarah couldn't see Dyson now, down behind his desk. She put round after round into the heavy desk, blasting one side of it into kindling. Dyson, scared out of his mind, had his face jammed against the carpet, terrified to move. He saw his kids in the hall. "Run, kids! Go! Run!" he shouted.

Out in the hall, Tarissa rounded the corner at a dead run. She saw the kids running toward her and grabbed them in her arms. in the dark study, she saw Dyson on the floor amid the splinters and shrapnel of the continuing fusillade. "_Miles_! Oh my God!" she screamed.

"Stay back!" Dyson yelled. On the floor, Dyson flinched as chucks of wood and shattered computer components showered down on him. He looked desperately toward the door, but knew he'd be totally exposed. He'd never make it. Sarah's rifle emptied with a final

CLACK!

She threw it down and drew her .45 smoothly from a shoulder base. She started toward the house, snapping back the slide on the pistol, chambering a round. She was in a fast, purposeful walk, keeping her eyes fixed on the target. She was utterly determined to kill this man. From under the desk, Dyson could see a sliver in the backyard. He saw Sarah's feet as she strode toward him. He tensed to make a break for the door. Sarah raised the pistol, eyes riveted ahead, controlling her breathing. Dyson sprang up in a full-tilt sprint. She tracked him. He hooked a foot on the cord of a toppled disk drive.

BOOM!

Sarah's shot blew apart a lamp where his head had been. Dyson hit the floor hard, but kept moving, scrambling forward. He could hear glass Crunch behind his as Sarah's dark form was framed in the blown-out floor-to-ceiling window. Dyson leaped toward the hall. BOOM! Sarah's second shot hit him, sending him spinning. He hit the floor in the hallway. Tarissa was screaming. Dyson struggled forward, stunned. There was a .45-caliber hole clean through his left shoulder. He smeared the wall with blood as he staggered up. Looking back, he saw the implacable figure behind him, coming on. He toppled through a doorway as -

BOOM!

BOOM!

Shots blew away the molding where he just was.

...

The Terminator, John, and Kylie leaped from the jeep, sprinting toward the house. There was the sound of muffled shots from outside. "Shit, we're too late!" John cried.

...

Sarah entered the living area of the house.

Tarissa had Blythe and she was screaming at Danny, who had run back to his collapsed father. "Danny! DANNY!"

"Daaaaddddyyyy!" Danny wailed, pulling at Dyson, crying and screaming, as his father tried to stagger forward. Tarissa dropped Blythe and ran back for Dyson, grabbing him.

Sarah loomed behind them with the pistol aimed. "Don't fucking move! Don't FUCKING MOVE!" she yelled, swinging the gun on Tarissa. "Get on the floor, bitch! Now! Fucking down! _NOW_!" Sarah was crazy-eyed now, shaking with the intensity of the moment. The kill had gone bad, with screaming kids and the wife involved... things she'd never figured on. Tarissa dropped to the knees, terrified as she looked into the muzzle of the gun.

Blythe ran to Dyson and hugged him, wailing. "Don't hurt my father!"

"Shut up, kid! Get out of the way!" Sarah screamed. Dyson looked up, through his pain and incomprehension. Why was this nightmare happening? The black gun muzzle was a foot from his face.

"Please... let... the kids... go..." Dyson gasped.

"Shut up! _SHUT UP_! Motherfucker! It's all your fault! IT'S YOUR FAULT!" Sarah screamed, psyching herself to pull the trigger... needing now to hate this man she doesn't know. It was a lot harder face-to-face. She was bathed in sweat, and it ran into her eyes. Blinking, she wiped it fast with one hand, then got it back on the gun, The .45 trembling. Sarah stood motionless as the forces at war evident behind her eyes. She looked into the faces of Dyson, Tarissa, Blythe, and Danny. Sarah took a sharp breath and all the muscles in her arms contracted as she tenses to fire. But her finger wouldn't do it. She lowered the gun very slowly and It dropped to her side in one hand. All the breath and energy seems to have gone out of her. She weakly raised her other hand in a strange gesture, like "Stay where you are, don't move". As if, should they move, the fragile balance might tip back the other way. She backed away from them slowly, panting. It was as if she were backing away in terror from what she almost did. She reached a wall and slumpped against it, Sliding down to her knees. The gun fell limply from her fingers. She rested her cheek against the wall just as The front door was kicked in. the Terminator stepped inside. John grabbed his sleeve and he and Kylie rain inside. John scoped out the situation in two seconds... Sarah, the gun, the sobbing family. he moved to Sarah while the Terminator checkd Dyson.

John knelt in front of his mother. She raised her head to look at him. He could see the tears spilling down her cheeks. "Mom? You okay?"

"I couldn't... oh, God!" Sarah gasped. she seemed to see him for the first time. "You... came here... to stop me?"

Kylie knelt beside her and nodded. "Uh huh"

Sarah reached out and took John's shoulder suddenly, surprising him... drawing him to her. She hugged him and a great sob welled up deep inside her, from a spring she had thought long dry. She hugged him fiercely as the sobs wracked her.

John clutched her shoulders. It was all he'd ever wanted. "It's okay. It'll by okay. We'll figure it out"

Kylie nodded. "John's right mom. Everything's going to be ok"

Sarah sobbed. "I love you, John. I always have"

John smiled a little. "I know, Mom. I know"

Tarissa looked around at the bizarre tableau.

The Terminator had wordlessly ripped open Dyson's shirt and examined the wound. "Clean penetration. No shattered bone. Compression should control the loss of blood. He said, taking Tarissa's hands and pressing them firmly over the entrance and exit wounds. "Do you have bandages?" he asked.

Dyson nodded. "In the bathroom. Danny, can you get them for us?" Danny nodded and ran down the hall. John disengaged from Sarah. She wiped her tears, the instinct to toughen up taking over again. But the healing moment had had its effect, nevertheless. John walked toward Dyson and the Terminator. "Who are you people?" Dyson asked.

Kylie went over and drew the Biker's knife from the Terminator's boot. She handed it to him. "Show him" she said. the Terminator took off his jacket to reveal bare arms. John quickly took Blythe by the hands and lead her down the hall, away from what was about to happen. The Terminator made a deep cut in his left forearm, just below the elbow. In one smooth motion, he cut all the way around his arm. With a second cut, he split the skin of the forearm from elbow to wrist, grasping the skin and stripping it off his forearm like a surgeon rips off a rubber glove. It came off with a sucking rip, leaving a bloody skeleton. But the skeleton was made of bright metal, and was laced with hydraulic actuators. The fingers were as finely crafted as watch parts... they flexed into a fist and extended. The Terminator held it up, palm out, in almost the exact position of the one in the vault at Cyberdyne.

Dyson's eyes widened, taking in the servo-hand in front of him. He'd seen one of these before. Tarissa was screaming now, but he didn't hear her. "My God" he mumbled, unable to believe what he was seeing.

"Now listen to me very carefully" the Terminator said.

INT. HOUSE/KITCHEN – LATER

Sarah put out her fifth cigarette. She was sitting on the counter, Kylie beside her. John, the Terminator, Dyson, and Tarissa were at the kitchen table, under a single overhead light. Dyson looked like that guy on the Sistine Chapel wall, the damned soul... eyes fixed and staring with terrifying knowledge. His shoulder was bandaged. The Terminator had put his jacket back arm and had put on some black leather gloves to cover up his metal hand. He started telling Dyson everything.

SARAH'S POV-  
Dyson listened while the Terminator laid it all down. Skynet. Judgment Day... the history of things to come. It's not every day you find out you're responsible for 3 billion deaths. He took it pretty well, considering...

NORMAL POV-  
"I feel like I'm gonna throw up" Dyson mumbled once the Terminator had finished speaking. Dyson looked around the table, clutching it like he was about to blow away. His face, his posture, his ragged voice expressed soul-wrenching terror. This was a man ripped out of normal life into their grim world. His voice was pleading. "You're judging me on thing's I haven't even done yet. Jesus. How were we supposed to know?"

Sarah spoke from the shadows behind them. Dyson turned to find her looking right at him. "Yeah. Right. How were you supposed to know? Fucking men... all you know how to do is thrust into the world with your... fucking ideas and your weapons. Did you know that every gun in the world is named after a man? Colt, Browning, Smith, Thompson, Kalashnikov... all men. Men built the hydrogen bomb, not women… men like you thought it up. You're so creative. You don't know what it's like to really create something... to create a life. To feel it growing inside you. All you know how to create is death... you fucking bastards!"

"Mom! Mom, we need to be more constructive here. I don't see this as a gender-related issue" Kylie said. she looked at the Dysons. "She's still tense" then she turned back to her mother. "We still have to figure out how to stop it all from happening. Right?"

"But I thought... aren't we changing things? I mean... right now? Changing the way it goes?" Tarissa asked.

"That's right! There's no way I'm going to finish the new processor now. Forget it. I'm out of it. I'm quitting Cyberdyne tomorrow... I'll sell real estate, I don't care…" Dyson said.

"That's not good enough" Sarah said coldly.

"Look, whatever you want me to do, I'll do. I just want my kids to have a chance to grow up, okay?" Dyson said, his voice pitiful.

"No one must follow your work" the Terminator said.

Dyson nodded. "Alright, yeah. You're right. We have to destroy the stuff at the lab, the files, disk drive... and everything I have here. Everything! I don't care"

...

Later, in Dyson's backyard, there was a fire roaring in a metal trash barrel. Stacks of files were dumped onto it. The Terminator dumped lighter fluid liberally over the fire, which flared up, lighting his face demonically. Sarah, Dyson, Tarissa, Kylie, and John returned from Dyson's office with more stuff - files, notes, optical disks. Even his kids were carrying stuff. It all went into the fire.

Dyson dropped the prototype onto the fire... his eyes hollow and distant. He stared into the fire, watching his world burning. he had a sudden thought. "Do you know about the chip?"

"What chip?" Sarah asked.

"They have it in a vault at Cyberdyne..." Dyson turned to the Terminator. "It's gotta be from the other one like you"

The Terminator turned to Sarah."The CPU from the first terminator"

"Son of a bitch, I knew it!" Sarah yelled.

"They told us not to ask where they got it. I thought... Japan... hell, I don't know. I didn't want to know" Dyson was saying.

"Those lying mother_fuckers_!" Sarah sneered.

"It was scary stuff, radically advanced. It was shattered... didn't work. But it gave us ideas, It took us in new directions... things we would never have thought of. All my work is based on it" Dyson said.

"It must be destroyed" the Terminator said.

"Can you get us in there, past security?" Sarah asked Dyson.

He nodded. "I think so, yeah. When?" he looked at her, the Terminator, then John and Kylie. He saw his answer. "_Now_?" he took a breath. "Yeah, right" He turned to his wife. Her face was streaked with tears, but her eyes were strong and clear.

Tarissa put her hands on his arm. She was stunned by what she had heard, but was dealing with it. She believed them. "Miles, I'm scared, Okay. But the only thing that scares me more than you going... is you _not_ going" He nodded. She was right.

Sarah turned to the Terminator. "Is it safe for them here?" the machine looked at Tarissa. "Take your kids. Go to a hotel. Right now. Don't pack" he looked at the others. "Let's go"

* * *

**well there you have it, and i _SWEAR_ i'm going to try to get in the habit of updating sooner. please don't give up on me guys, i _will_ finish this story. but for now, i hope you enjoyed this chapter, and _please_ review!**

**-FreddysNightmare1984**


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